When home fronts become battlegrounds: a transnational history of violence against civilians in Japan, Germany, and Britain in the two World Wars

Weekly internal seminar by Sheldon Garon, Nissan Professor of History and East Asian Studies at Princeton University, and 2021-2022 Paris IAS Fellow.

Communication discussed by Annette Becker, professeure émérite d'hisoire contemporaine, Université Paris Nanterre.

Presentation

This project offers a connected and comparative history of home fronts in Japan, Germany, and Britain from World War I through World War II. The focus is on air raids, food scarcity, and civilian "morale". The study shows how the practices of the "home front" were transnationally constructed as part of global thinking on "total war". It also examines the development of transnational strategies to destroy home fronts by bombing, blockade, and "demoralizing" civilians.