| Examining over two hundred diaries from Chinese Nationalist, Japanese, and American servicemen during the Second World War, this dissertation traces the evolution of servicemen's subjectivities, juxtaposed with key events in their battlefield experience, in order to understand the boundaries between experience, language, identity and national mobilization. In a topic where the concern over war responsibility dominates all discussion, current understandings of identity and social control are excessively deterministic as a result of their focus on the structural machinations of the state. No serviceman uncritically embraced propaganda, even among the "victorious" armies. By showing how these men strove within the bounds of contemporary discourse to develop identities in diaries---both for and against the war effort---that helped them to remain part of their community and survive the war, this dissertation argues that they both exercise agency in forming their identities and are therefore responsible for their actions.;As the political landscapes of Asia were transformed again and again, shattering one historical memory and replacing it with another, servicemen of all ranks and nationalities struggled to piece together a language and an identity that helped them adapt to the changing order and maintain some sense of personal consistency. Using the diary to record this process, however, was a Faustian bargain; once the "true" history of one's self is recorded along with the "facts," it becomes an immutable testament that can only be evaded by destroying the diary. Following Communist victory in 1949, the surviving records of Nationalist soldiers' experiences, trapped on the mainland, were suppressed in order to solidify the new political order. For the Japanese that found the courage to save their diaries, the documents became both a powerful incentive to seek reconciliation with China as well as a source of pride for those who continue to view Japan's role in the war positively. The subsequent stubbornness of many veterans to accept the orthodox postwar narrative, wielding their diaries as they once did their rifles, is a direct result of the power of the diary as a self-disciplinary tool. |
