Female soldiers are under represented and stereotyped,
but the world has much to learn from them, said
Laura Browder, professor of English, at Tuesday’s Elske
v. P. Smith Lecture, “When Janie Comes Marching
Home,” at the University Student Commons.
Browder was the recipient of the lecturer award,
which is given to a faculty member who expands
the scope of research at the university, said Dean
of the College of Humanities and Sciences, Robert
Holsworth.
“The female soldier will change the view of the
world today,” Browder said.
At least 160,000 female soldiers have fought or are
currently fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. However,
their role is rarely a topic of discussion, Browder
said. As the number of female soldiers continues to
increase, American society needs to understand what
it is like to be in that role, she said.
“Their experience is so under reported,” Browder
said.
Browder said she is surprised more hasn’t been
written about the wide range of experiences that
female soldiers go through.
For some females, gender plays a huge role in what
they do as soldiers, she said, while others say that
their gender played no role whatsoever in their work
for the military. When it comes down to it, female
soldiers are just doing their job, Browder said.
“Women soldiers think of themselves as soldiers,”
she said.
The overwhelming trend that Browder found in
her research on the matter was the desire of the
female soldier to fight.
“(Female soldiers) really want to fight in battle,”
Browder said.
Although many of them love the movie “G.I. Jane”,
Browder said, they are often offended by the way the
media portrays them. Whether it be in the news or
in movies, Browder said, the only examples people
are given of women in the military are Jessica Lynch
and Lynndie England.
These portrayals are either overly sexualized
or hyper-masculine, Browder said. Jessica Lynch’s
rescue from an Iraqi hospital made it seem that she
was too delicate to handle the war, while photos of
Lynndie England posing with blindfolded detainees at
Abu Ghraib prison portrayed her as a woman whose
femininity had been wrecked by the war.
“Women soldiers get to choose between sluts or
bitches,” Browder said.
Until the 1960s, women in the military were encouraged
to wear hats, gloves and high heels, she said.
Women in the military today struggle to differentiate
themselves from stereotypes, and the stress is often
overwhelming, Browder said.
Many women who return from service have posttraumatic
stress disorder and will engage in risky
behavior to recreate the adrenalin rush of battle.
“It is not acceptable for women to get drunk and
get into fights,” Browder said.
They seek thrills elsewhere, she said, and doctors
are seeing a high number of head traumas that are
the result of motorcycle accidents among female
veterans. Female soldiers need to stop being pushed
aside and used for entertainment and start being taken
seriously, she said.
“It is my hope . that this issue will allow for the
Equal Rights Amendment to pass,” Browder said.