The Great War, the child's body and the American Red Cross

Bibliographic Data

ID5798511
AuthorsFriederike Kind‐kovác (0000-0001-7487-3240, ,, corresponding author)
Year2016
Volume23
Issue1-2
Pages33-62
Publication date2016-01-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Review of History Revue européenne d histoire (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1350-7486 • E-ISSN: 1469-8293
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13507486.2015.1121971
OpenAlexW2297036572
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited37

This article examines the child-relief activities of the American Red Cross in Hungary in the aftermath of the Great War, offering an insight into the workings of humanitarianism in interwar Europe. A close look at this one Central European 'playground' of transatlantic intervention helps us understand the logic and the underlying political, economic and ideological motives behind Allied humanitarian aid to 'enemy' children. Analysis of the ways in which the war's aftermath affected children, their bodies and their relief throws light on the relationship between violent conflicts, children in need and humanitarian intervention. The article looks particularly at the role of the child's damaged body and its photographic representation, making it what Cathleen Canning calls an 'embodied experience of war'. Exploration of the humanitarian discourse around the suffering child helps us identify the humanitarian reaction to the unforeseen social consequences of wartime confrontation. The article argues that the harmed body of the 'enemy child' served to mobilise transnational compassion that challenged the war's deeply anchored 'friend-foe' mentality. The child turned into a means of configuring and translating human suffering beyond ideological and political borders. At the same time humanitarian child relief helped to further consolidate asymmetric international power relations

Compassion · Humanitarian aid · Humanitarian intervention · European history and politics · Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies

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