Overview
The National World War II Museum and The Society for Military History will be co-hosting “The Summer Seminar in Military History” from June 12 – July 2, 2022. The purpose of this three-week, in-residence experience is to grow and strengthen the study of military history by introducing fellows to the profession’s fundamental concepts and questions, its contemporary concerns and approaches, and its leading scholars.
Application deadline: March 15, 2022
The National World War II Museum and The Society for Military History will be co-hosting “The Summer Seminar in Military History” from 12 June – 2 July 2022. The purpose of this three-week, in-residence experience is to grow and strengthen the study of military history by introducing fellows to the profession’s fundamental concepts and questions, its contemporary concerns and approaches, and its leading scholars.
The program consists of a series of content and pedagogical seminars led by expert faculty and guest lecturers, as well as museum tours and battlefield staff rides. Lodging, meals, and a stipend are provided.
Summer Seminar in Military History Goals
- Fellows master the pedagogical techniques required to develop and teach survey courses and more focused course offerings in military history.
- Fellows gain the methodological and historiographical knowledge that will prepare them to make scholarly contributions to the field.
- Fellows are exposed to the historiography that has shaped the development and directions of military history.
- Fellows are introduced to the wealth of resources available in the field and offered advice on how to use them in their teaching and scholarship.
- Leading military historians share their knowledge with fellows and a broader audience through public presentations at the Institute.
- Fellows become familiar with the expectations of Army and Navy ROTC courses fulfilling curricular requirements for pre-commissioning military and maritime history.
- Fellows grow personally and professionally by developing networks among and across chronological and topical fields of study.
Applicants will be selected based upon their potential contributions to the field of military history and upon the contribution the program can make to their future teaching and research. Recent PhDs, advanced graduate students who have completed all requirements for their doctorate other than submission of the dissertation (ABD), and senior faculty members interested in working in military history but without a strong background in the field are eligible to apply.
Week 1 – Pre-Twentieth Century
Central Learning Objectives – Week 1
- Define “military history” from a holistic perspective and become familiar with the field’s fundamental terms, concepts, and questions
- Understand how and why societies go to war and how they intend to use military force as an instrument of policy and grand strategy
- Assess the differences in how societies mobilize for war—politically, militarily, socially, and economically—& the costs of that mobilization
Core Building Blocks
- What is “military history”? How do scholars use key terms and concepts in narrating their stories and in approaching the larger discipline?
- Be conversant with the major theorists of war (western and global) and their influence on nations’ professional conduct of war
- Appreciate the relationships between modern war and a society’s economic and social mobilization for war
- Understand the trends toward the professionalization of nations’ military forces in the modern era
- Evaluate the influence of industrialization on modern war
Supporting Building Blocks
- Become familiar with the evolution of military thought and theory over time
- Comprehend the relationships between military service, citizenship, and identity (both individual and collective)
- Understand how societies view differences between professional and citizen soldiers and how military organizations populate their ranks
- Appreciate the role and impact of developments in science and technology, particularly in weapons development
- Understand the ways in which nationalism, patriotism, and societal values influence war
Scheduling Layout for Week 1
Day 1
- Welcome
- Defining Military History and War
Day 2
- The “Age of Limited War”
Day 3
- The Ages of Revolutionary and Napoleonic Warfare
Day 4
- On Theories of War
- Trends Toward Army Professionalism
Day 5
- War in the Industrial Age-The American Civil War and Reconstruction
Day 6
- Staff Ride
Day 7
- Study Day
Week 2 – The Age of Global War
Central Learning Objectives – Week 2
- Understand war from a global perspective and how different nations and societies conceive of and conduct war in diverse ways
- Evaluate the conduct of warfare and the influence of leadership at all levels of war (military and political)
- Evaluate the role of the home front on the conduct of war and civilians’ relations with wartime armed forces
Core Building Blocks
- Evaluate how civil-military relations in different societies influence the conceptualization and conduct of war at multiple levels
- Appreciate the soldier experience in war
- Appreciate the ways in which staff rides and battlefield analyses can contribute to a deeper understanding of military history
- Assess the ways in which identity (including class, race, gender, ethnicity, and religion) have influenced the ways in which societies has mobilized manpower and popular opinion and conceptualized their enemies
- Appreciate the moral and ethical issues related to war’s conduct
Supporting Building Blocks
- Consider the similarities and differences among war, genocide, and mass political violence
- Become familiar with arguments on cultural “ways of war”
- Understand how doctrine is influenced by organizational and institutional peculiarities of a nation’s armed forces
- Consider the ways in which ideology has had an impact on modern war
- Appreciate the value of veterans’ memoirs in understanding war as a human phenomenon
Scheduling Layout for Week 2
Day 8
- The First World War and its Aftermath
Day 9
- World War II-Causes, Alliances, and Strategies
Day 10
- World War II-A Global War
Day 11
- World War II-Battle Analysis and the Experience of War
Day 12
- World War II-Global Home Fronts at War
Day 13
- Optional ROTC Program Requirements Seminar
Day 14
- Study Day
Week 3 – The Post-World War II Era
Central Learning Objectives – Week 3
- Evaluate how and why wars end—militarily, politically, and diplomatically—and how societies and their armed forces define “victory” and “defeat” during war and in its aftermath
- Appraise the similarities and differences among military history and memorialization, myth, and memory
- Understand how societies and their military institutions deal with veterans issues, both during and after wars
Core Building Blocks
- Consider how societies and their armed forces explain the outcomes of wars and how those explanations shape nations and militaries after wars end
- Examine the veteran experience and soldiers’ reintegration into society during and after war
- Understand the experiences of civilians caught in the path of war
- Appreciate the difficulties of nation-building in times of war
- Comprehend the value (and potential limitations) of oral histories in comparison to “official” histories of war
Supporting Building Blocks
- Appreciate the ways in which members of society dissent against war and the political and military impact of that dissent
- Evaluate the effects of war on social dislocation, migration, and refugee communities
- Appreciate class issues in relation to social mobilization, recruiting, and military service in times of war
- Evaluate the role that antiwar and peace movements play in policymakers’ wartime decision-making processes
- Consider the environmental issues of war
Scheduling Layout for Week 3
Day 15
- The Cold War-A Grand Strategic Overview
Day 16
- The Age of Limited War in a Nuclear Era
Day 17
- Wars of “National Liberation,” Part I
Day 18
- Wars of “National Liberation,” Part II
Day 19
- “Modern War” in the Post-9/11 Era
- Myth, Memory, and Memorialization
Day 20
- Out-processing
Day 21
- N/A
Gregory A. Daddis, PhD
Gregory A. Daddis is a professor of history at San Diego State University and holds the USS Midway Chair in Modern US Military History. Daddis joined SDSU after directing the MA Program in War and Society Studies at Chapman University. Prior, he served as the Chief of the American History Division in the Department of History at the United States Military Academy at West Point. A retired US Army colonel, he deployed to both Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom. Daddis specializes in the history of the Vietnam Wars and the Cold War era and has authored five books, including Pulp Vietnam: War and Gender in Cold War Men's Adventure Magazines (2020) and Withdrawal: Reassessing America’s Final Years in Vietnam (2017). He has also published numerous journal articles and several op-ed pieces commenting on current military affairs, to include writings in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and National Interest magazine.
Lorien Foote, PhD
Lorien Foote is the Patricia & Bookman Peters Professor in History at Texas A&M University. She is the author of four books, editor of three volumes, and writer of numerous articles and essays on the cultural, intellectual, and military history of the American Civil War. Her books include the just-published Rites of Retaliation: Civilization, Soldiers, and Campaigns in the American Civil War (2020); The Yankee Plague: Escaped Union Prisoners and the Collapse of the Confederacy (2016), which was a 2017 Choice Outstanding Academic Title; and The Gentlemen and the Roughs: Manhood, Honor, and Violence in the Union Army (2010), which was a finalist and Honorable Mention for the 2011 Lincoln Prize. She is the co-editor, with Earl J. Hess, of The Oxford Handbook of the American Civil War. She is the creator and principal investigator of a digital humanities project, which is mapping the escape and movement of 3000 Federal prisoners of war. The project includes contributions from undergraduate researchers at four universities. It can be explored on-line at www.ehistory.org/projects/fugitive-federals.html.
Robert M. Citino, PhD
Robert Citino is the Museum's Samuel Zemurray Stone Senior Historian. He is an award-winning military historian and scholar who has published 10 books including The Wehrmacht’s Last Stand: The German Campaigns of 1944-1945, The Wehrmacht Retreats: Fighting a Lost War, 1943, Death of the Wehrmacht: The German Campaigns of 1942, and The German Way of War: From the Thirty Years' War to the Third Reich and numerous articles covering World War II and 20th century military affairs. In 2021, he won the Samuel Morison Prize from the Society for Military History, for lifetime achievement in the field. He speaks widely and contributes regularly to general readership magazines such as World War II. He graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in history from Ohio State University and earned a M.A. and Ph.D. from Indiana University. Dr. Citino enjoys close ties with the US military establishment, and taught one year at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and two years at the U.S. Army War College.
Kara Dixon Vuic, PhD
Kara Dixon Vuic is the LCpl. Benjamin W. Schmidt Professor of War, Conflict, and Society in Twentieth-Century America at Texas Christian University and the author of The Girls Next Door: Bringing the Home Front to the Front Lines (Harvard University Press, 2019). She is also the author of Officer, Nurse, Woman: The Army Nurse Corps in the Vietnam War (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), editor of The Routledge Handbook on Gender, War, and the U.S. Military (2017), and co-editor (with Beth Bailey, Alesha Doan, and Shannon Portillo) of Managing Sex in the U.S. Military (University of Nebraska Press, 2022). She is co-editor (with Richard Fogarty) of the University of Nebraska Press’s book series “Studies in War, Society, and the Military.” She is writing a new book called “Drafting Women.”
The Summer Seminar in Military History 2022 Application Form
The Higgins Hotel & Conference Center
The official Hotel of The National WWII Museum, this stunning art-deco style property offers first-class accommodations, meeting spaces, and dining options providing a sophisticated lodging experience for guests. Named after local Higgins Industries shipbuilder Andrew Higgins, the Hotel pays tribute to a historic time when all Americans came together to secure victory and help change the world.
