Aberration of Mind

More than 150 years after its end, we still struggle to understand the full extent of the human toll of the Civil War and the psychological crisis it created. In Aberration of Mind, Diane Miller Sommerville offers the first book-length treatment of suicide in the South during the Civil War era, givi...

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Main Author: Sommerville, Diane Miller
Format: Online
Language:English
Published: The University of North Carolina Press 2023
Subjects:
Online Access:ONIX_20231005_9781469643588_1638
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author Sommerville, Diane Miller
author_browse Sommerville, Diane Miller
author_facet Sommerville, Diane Miller
author_sort Sommerville, Diane Miller
collection Directory of Open Access Books
description More than 150 years after its end, we still struggle to understand the full extent of the human toll of the Civil War and the psychological crisis it created. In Aberration of Mind, Diane Miller Sommerville offers the first book-length treatment of suicide in the South during the Civil War era, giving us insight into both white and black communities, Confederate soldiers and their families, as well as the enslaved and newly freed. With a thorough examination of the dynamics of both racial and gendered dimensions of psychological distress, Sommerville reveals how the suffering experienced by Southerners living in a war zone generated trauma that, in extreme cases, led some Southerners to contemplate or act on suicidal thoughts. Sommerville recovers previously hidden stories of individuals exhibiting suicidal activity or aberrant psychological behavior she links to the war and its aftermath. This work adds crucial nuance to our understanding of how personal suffering shaped the way southerners viewed themselves in the Civil War era and underscores the full human costs of war.
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publishDate 2023
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publishDateSort 2023
publisher The University of North Carolina Press
publisherStr The University of North Carolina Press
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spelling doab-20.500.12854ir-1158722026-04-30T09:56:29Z Aberration of Mind Sommerville, Diane Miller History American Studies Military Studies thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHK History of the Americas thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history More than 150 years after its end, we still struggle to understand the full extent of the human toll of the Civil War and the psychological crisis it created. In Aberration of Mind, Diane Miller Sommerville offers the first book-length treatment of suicide in the South during the Civil War era, giving us insight into both white and black communities, Confederate soldiers and their families, as well as the enslaved and newly freed. With a thorough examination of the dynamics of both racial and gendered dimensions of psychological distress, Sommerville reveals how the suffering experienced by Southerners living in a war zone generated trauma that, in extreme cases, led some Southerners to contemplate or act on suicidal thoughts. Sommerville recovers previously hidden stories of individuals exhibiting suicidal activity or aberrant psychological behavior she links to the war and its aftermath. This work adds crucial nuance to our understanding of how personal suffering shaped the way southerners viewed themselves in the Civil War era and underscores the full human costs of war. 2023-10-05T10:50:32Z 2023-10-05T10:50:32Z 2018 book ONIX_20231005_9781469643588_1638 9781469643588 9781469643304 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/115872 eng image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9781469643588_Sommerville The University of North Carolina Press 10.5149/9781469643588_Sommerville 10.5149/9781469643588_Sommerville f46e5319-8d09-4c63-b9f2-a13480694ab4 dcf50849-b837-420d-ac46-64995a7bf0d4 9781469643588 9781469643304 [...] National Endowment for the Humanities U.S. National Endowment for the Humanities 10.13039/100000103 open access
spellingShingle History
American Studies
Military Studies
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHK History of the Americas
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history
Sommerville, Diane Miller
Aberration of Mind
title Aberration of Mind
title_full Aberration of Mind
title_fullStr Aberration of Mind
title_full_unstemmed Aberration of Mind
title_short Aberration of Mind
title_sort aberration of mind
topic History
American Studies
Military Studies
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHK History of the Americas
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history
topic_facet History
American Studies
Military Studies
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHK History of the Americas
thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology::NH History::NHW Military history
url ONIX_20231005_9781469643588_1638
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