Pulp Vietnam
War and Gender in Cold War Men's Adventure Magazines

Explores how Cold War men's magazines idealized warrior-heroes and sexual-conquerors and normalized conceptions of martial masculinity.

Gregory A. Daddis (Author)

9781108493505, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 22 October 2020

358 pages
23.5 x 16 x 2.5 cm, 0.67 kg

'… Pulp Vietnam examines an overlooked piece of Cold War culture and explains how it helped create real-world forms of violence.' Kyle Burke, Pacific Historical Review

In this compelling evaluation of Cold War popular culture, Pulp Vietnam explores how men's adventure magazines helped shape the attitudes of young, working-class Americans, the same men who fought and served in the long and bitter war in Vietnam. The 'macho pulps' - boasting titles like Man's Conquest, Battle Cry, and Adventure Life - portrayed men courageously defeating their enemies in battle, while women were reduced to sexual objects, either trivialized as erotic trophies or depicted as sexualized villains using their bodies to prey on unsuspecting, innocent men. The result was the crafting and dissemination of a particular version of martial masculinity that helped establish GIs' expectations and perceptions of war in Vietnam. By examining the role that popular culture can play in normalizing wartime sexual violence and challenging readers to consider how American society should move beyond pulp conceptions of 'normal' male behavior, Daddis convincingly argues that how we construct popular tales of masculinity matters in both peace and war.

Introduction. Warrior heroes and sexual conquerors
1. Macho pulp and the American cold war man
2. My father's war: the allure of World War II and Korea
3. The imagined 'savage' woman
4. The Vietnamese reality
5. War and sexual violence come to Vietnam
Conclusion. Male veterans remember their war.

Subject Areas: Military history: post WW2 conflicts [HBWS], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], History of the Americas [HBJK]