Waging Gendered Wars ― U.s. Military Women in Afghanistan and Iraq

Waging Gendered Wars examines, through the analytical lens of feminist international relations theory, how U.S. military women have impacted and been affected by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although women were barred from serving formally in ground combat positions within the U.S. armed forces during both wars, U.S. female soldiers are being killed in action. By examining how U.S. military women's agency as soldiers, veterans, and casualties of war affect the planning and execution of war, Whaley Eager assesses the ways in which the global world of international politics and warfare has become localized in the life and death narratives of female service personnel impacted by combat experience, homelessness, military sexual trauma, PTSD, and the deaths of fellow soldiers.

Paige Whaley Eager received a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Delaware in 2003. Since 2005, she has taught at Hood College in Frederick, Maryland and is currently the Chair of the Political Science Department and Co-Director of the Global Studies program. Her research interests include: Gender and War, Global Governance, and Gender and Political Violence. Professor Eager is the author of three monographs: Global Population Policy: From Population Control to Reproductive Rights (2004), From Freedom Fighters to Terrorists: Women and Political Violence (2008), and Waging Gendered Wars: U.S. Military Women in Afghanistan and Iraq (forthcoming).