Military Brats: Legacies of Childhood Inside the Fortress - Paperback

by Pat Conroy (Introduction by), Mary Edwards Wertsch (Author)

A startling, groundbreaking exploration, Military Brats is the first book to identify a cultural group--children of the military--that had been completely below the societal radar. Based on five years of research, including in-depth interviews with eighty military brats from all the armed services as well as physicians, teachers, psychologists, social workers, and others, this book finds the patterns that link all military children to a common cultural identity. Wertsch employs extensive research to probe the consequences-both positive and negative-of being raised in a family characterized by rigid discipline, nomadic rootlessness, dedication to military mission, and the threat of war and personal loss. With its clear-eyed, sometimes shocking depictions of alcoholism and domestic violence, and its empathy for military parents caught up in an extremely demanding way of life, Military Brats provides catharsis, insight, and a path toward healing. Mary Wertsch not only defines America's most invisible minority for the very first time, she also passionately exhorts the children of warriors to come to terms with their native Fortress legacies so that they might take full advantage of the positive endowment that is also their birthright.Civilians will find this book eye-opening. Military parents will find it at once challenging and sympathetic. And military brats will know in their hearts that this is the book they've been waiting for.This new edition retains the same content as the original, with only minor changes. This edition is now labelled Volume 1; a Volume 2 is in the works.

Author Biography

Mary Edwards Wertsch, a seasoned investigative reporter and writer, was raised in a career Army infantry family. By the time she was 18 she had lived in three countries and 20 different houses. Currently she lives in the Midwest, where she continues to write and lecture about the military brat cultural identity she has been credited with identifying since this ground-breaking book was first published in 1991. Her current research extends her work on military families, the cultural identity of military brats, and issues related to the larger group of Third Culture Kids (TCKs) including other kinds of mobile childhood.