Identities

Abstract

One of the persistent themes of the trench press involved issues of identity. This concern revolved not only around the finer points of nation, ethnicity and class — by and large, these were taken for granted — but around basic questions of who belonged and who did not belong. Who and what the writers, artists, editors and readers of trench journals considered themselves to be was one of the most important reasons for the existence of these publications. Just as important was the opposite: who was not one of ‘us.’ The expression of these concerns resulted in the assumption, often implicit, of who and what ‘we’ constituted as well as much more explicit and frequently stereotypical views of ‘others.’ Identity was as much a projection of the shortcomings of others as it was an assertion and reinforcement of more or less positive ideals, values and images about the trench soldiers themselves. The identities around which these notions clustered and the modes of their articulation were usually combinations of the regional/local, the ethnic, the national, and the occupational. Through these framing perspectives, trench journals dealt with the tensions and uncertainties inherent in the mass mobilisation of diverse millions using such devices as the cartoon, the deployment and/or fetishisation of trench lingo and a variety of usually parodied or otherwise subverted literary, journalistic or folkloric genres and sub-genres.

It’s a long trail in peace-time where the roving Britons stray, But in war-time, in war-time, it’s just across the way!

From ‘The Younger Son,’ 1915