Shell Shock. Traumatic Neurosis and the British Soldiers of the First World War

Description

To the British soldiers of the Great War who heard about it, 'shell shock' was uncanny, amusing and sad. To those who experienced it, the condition was shameful, unjustly stigmatized and life-changing. The first full-length study of the British 'shell shocked' soldiers of the Great War combines social and medical history to investigate the experience of psychological casualties on the Western Front, in hospitals, and through their postwar lives. It also investigates the condition's origin and consequences within British culture.

Contents

Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction

PART I: DISCOVERIES
Shocking Modernity: Hysteria, Technology and Warfare
Casualties: On the Western Front

PART II: WARTIME
Enlistment: Army Policy, Politics and the Press
Treatment: On the Home Front
Patients: The Other Ranks
Patients: The Officer Ranks

PART II: LEGACIES
Demobilization: On Returning Home
Veterans: War Neurotic Ex-Servicemen
Recall: The Great War in the Twentieth Century

Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index