Robert K. Webb Lecture with Prof. Julie Gottlieb
Part of the Dresher Center Fall 2023 Humanities Forum
Location
Library and Gallery, Albin O. Kuhn : Gallery
Date & Time
November 9, 2023, 4:00 PM-5:30 PM
Description
The Department of History presents their annual Robert K. Webb Lecture:
"'The Crisis seems to have filled the world with nervous break-downs': Narrating Britain's 'War of Nerves', 1938-1940"
Julie Gottlieb, Professor, History, University of Sheffield
Description:
The long months between the Munich Crisis of fall 1938 and the spring 1940 end of the eight-month period at the start of World War Two in which there were few armed engagements, has been called the Phoney War. During this time, the British public experienced what has been described as a 'war of nerves.' In this talk, Julie Gottlieb will explore how writers, politicians, academics, anthropological researchers, psychiatrists, and advertisers projected nervous disorder onto bodies and the body politic, making a case for renaming the first battle of Britain's People's War as the war of nerves.