ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores army responses to the stigma soldiers, which often attach to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It attempts to show why and how PTSD has become the predominant expression of the suffering of military personnel and their families at the particular historical moment. The book explores the limitations in human abilities to codeswitch, which in this context means the way soldiers and families must move between often radically different sets or "codes" of norms and behaviors as they undergo multiple deployments. It describes the landscape of the proliferating number of providers of health, social, and pastoral services as well as community organizations who are seeking to meet the ever-expanding needs of returning soldiers and their families. The book argues that the anxieties and fears intrinsic to warmaking fuel polarizing dynamics, enforcing walls between intimates, and rendering those once familiar as strangers.
