The Military Afterlives Project was interviewed this month by the The Defence Research Network as part of our ongoing impact work and sharing our valuable research work. The Defence Research Network came about out of a conversation back in 2016 between PhD students who felt isolated in their respective South West institutions studying defence. We have formed a supportive community of researchers with diverse interests ranging from the history of airpower, counterinsurgency, veterans families and cybersecurity. We have build up our presence on social media and held numerous face to face networking events as well as forming friendships and professional collaborations.
We connect our community primarily through Twitter where we encourage researchers to ask questions, comment on defence news and share recommendations about books, conferences and events and job vacancies.
The DRN website can be found at this link.
Defence Research Network (defenceresnet.org)
For this month’s theme, we’ve been chatting to the research team behind the Military Afterlives project (@MltryAfterlives on Twitter). The project aimed to understand how British veterans and their families have experienced the transition out of the military and back into civilian life. It used a narrative methodology which means that the research team were able to hear the stories of veterans and their families, told in their own words. Below, we share the reflections of three of the researchers.
Dr Sarah Bulmer
How easy was it to reach and access the veteran community for this project?
It was a lot easier than I initially expected. One of the reasons for this, I suspect, is the sense of camaraderie amongst the veteran community. Indeed, a lot of veterans I spoke to were more than willing to help, as they felt that if their contribution would help other veterans then they had a moral obligation to do so. Having a civilian-veteran research team was valuable in this regard, as it made us more approachable, and showed that we are taking veterans voices seriously. David and I went on BBC Radio Devon and BBC Radio Cornwall, as well as advertising on social media and using personal networks. Word of mouth played a key role in our recruitment as veterans we had interviewed told other veterans about us. We were even approached by people outside of the southwest – my sense is that there is a desire to tell these stories within the veteran community.
What do you think can be gained by understanding veterans’ transition to civilian life as a series of transitional experiences?
Looking at the transition of veterans to civilian life as a series of transitional experiences, as opposed to a one-time event with ‘outcomes’, provides a more holistic understanding of the challenges faced by veterans. It moves away from the current policy and public rhetoric that frame the transition as a binary success or failure. This approach acknowledges that people’s experiences are diverse and complex, and that their transition journey can extend for decades after leaving military service.
Adopting a transitional experiences framework has significant implications for the provision of support services for veterans. It suggests that support should be available throughout their lives, rather than being limited to a specific timeframe after they leave the military. For more information on the implications of this framework, please visit the Military Afterlives website at https://militaryafterlives.co.uk/.
What is the methodological significance of having a mixed civilian and veteran team on the research project?
Having a mixed civilian and veteran team has advantages. Caroline and David worked with me on all aspects of the research process, from deciding what to research and how to do it, to interpreting the data, networking, and driving engagement and dissemination of the findings. This ensured that veterans’ perspectives were embedded within the project from the start, and that the project benefitted from the ‘insider’ knowledge from their lived experience and the social legitimacy their involvement conferred. The critical dialogue between insiders and outsiders (me) was especially valuable when interpreting and analysing the data (see also West and Antrobus 2022 on this).
In addition to the practical benefits, for me, there is political and ethical importance to having community members of the research focus meaningfully involved in the research process. This is particularly true for such an ‘over-researched’ population who are frequently objects of research rather than active agents in the process (Bulmer and Jackson 2016).
Who are you hoping to reach with the findings of this research project?
Our research is relevant to everyone as we all encounter veterans at some point in our lives. However, we are developing impact activities that target distinct audiences, including the general public, policymakers, service providers and the wider military community. You can follow our activities on our blog.
Dr Caroline Micklewright
Why do you think veterans are reluctant to share their stories?
There are several reasons why veterans may be hesitant to share their stories. In a recent conversation with a group of female veterans, I was reminded of the conflicts many veterans face in discussing their backgrounds and experiences. One issue is the reluctance to identify as a veteran, as the term is still associated with older men, which excludes younger men and women by default. Even some who qualify as veterans feel they do not “deserve” to be recognized as such if they have not been involved in operations or conflicts. This creates a problem when considering the number of veterans who may feel this way.
Another factor that contributes to this reluctance is a fear of being judged as “military” with all the cultural associations such a link would bring. Leaving the Armed Forces opens up a world of possibilities, and many veterans want to avoid being judged by their old rank, service, or military associations as these could potentially restrict and limit their future opportunities. Additionally, there is a lack of understanding of military cultures in civil society, which often leads to stereotypical perspectives.
Furthermore, lacking medals or only having a “chocolate medal” (Jubilee medal) can also cause consternation when identifying as a veteran, as it may feel as though one is making a claim of valour or bravery that was unearned or undeserved. On the other hand, those who have earned operational medals may feel reluctant to re-live the emotions surrounding them as they may be complex and contradictory. Despite some research having been done on this topic, I believe it is still worth exploring further, particularly with regards to the cultural associations linked with being a veteran and the lack of understanding of military cultures in civil society.
We found a lot of evidence of these challenges in the Military Afterlives data.
What were the differences in the stories you heard from military family members rather than the veterans themselves?
Many of the participants in the study had multiple roles or identities as they were service personnel, spouses, or parents of serving individuals. The stories from family members were mostly about domestic life rather than professional life, focusing on the challenges of living in military accommodation as a military spouse or being a parent to military children. The veterans recognized the strains military life had put on their families, and although they accepted the sacrifices required, they reflected on the impact it had on their children, spouses, parents, and even their younger selves.
The spouses were generally supportive of their partners’ military roles and responsibilities, but they also expressed concerns about the demands of service life and the military’s shortcomings in supporting the transition to civilian life, especially for individuals suffering from PTSD. One father shared a story about recognizing his own PTSD only after seeing it in his son, who had followed in his footsteps into service.
The life story approach that we used, as well as the age range of the participants, allowed for rich and diverse stories, enabling exploration of how military culture, norms, and behaviours have changed over the decades and what has remained the same. The stories also helped to identify areas where support could be improved.
What are some of the main assumptions made by those outside of the military community about veterans?
This is a difficult question, as all our participants were from within the military community, but their experiences have helped us shape our understanding of cultural and behavioural differences between military and civilian worlds. The moments of navigation between these worlds are what we describe as ‘transitional experiences’. These are moments of disjuncture between military and civilian worlds when behaviours and expectations are thrown into contrast.
Our main finding was probably the lack of general awareness of military culture/behaviours, and over-reliance on outdated or false stereotypes based on TV, films, and media. Sometimes these stereotypes can be positive, but this can also be detrimental and while many of our participants transitioned into successful jobs and settled into happy family lives, others struggled to understand their own motivations and deeply held values with negative results.
I would argue that until military personnel understand themselves better, it is difficult to expect civilians with no military experience to understand us. In saying that, however, as a veteran and a researcher, I would also argue that civilians have a responsibility to better understand their own military and the people who serve in it by questioning stereotypes and assumptions.
How did working with a civilian research lead, in Sarah, challenge you as a veteran researcher in the context of this project?
Working with Sarah and David has been an amazing experience. As a veteran researcher, it is always a challenge to avoid assumptions based on your own experiences, but in hand with that comes a depth of insight and understanding that may be difficult for researchers who lack military experience to appreciate. However, undertaking research about veterans can be like walking a tightrope through cloud, sometimes you can see the rope and other times you can’t see it, you can only feel it. Working with David, who has very different military experiences and background to myself, meant we were able to compare and contrast our understanding of military life and culture, and Sarah was able to facilitate this by probing and questioning our assumptions and reasoning (many of which were temporal or service specific).
As a result, we were able to demonstrate that the military is not a homogenous mass coloured green. Thankfully through the course of the project we were able to share our vulnerabilities as veterans and as researchers, recognising the toll such work can take and the emotional labour involved in a supportive and collegial atmosphere. David’s support and Sarah’s insight and experience as a critical military researcher has developed my understanding of civil/military relations which in turn has enabled me to regard the military from another different perspective. This has been a welcome challenge for which I am very grateful.
Dr David Jackson
What is it about the ordinary day-to day experiences of veterans that it is important that we hear?
I believe that it’s important to listen to the everyday experiences of veterans and their families, and recognize that even in the mundane, there are transitional moments that can have a big impact. By understanding these moments, we can work on improving support interventions for veterans and their families in different sectors of society. Instead of just reacting to problems, we need to take a proactive approach to support. We should also acknowledge that despite their military experiences, the majority of veterans are doing okay. However, I think the problem is very complex and it starts with the question of ‘what is okay?’ Being okay is not measured through scores in questionnaires that then are applied to some measurement of ‘being okay’. People are more complex than that. The subjectiveness of individual experiences is so important to help us understand who we are. Undoubtedly there are common threads within the Military Afterlives data that can be applied across veterans generally, but these commonalities are framed within their individual life narratives.
How did you use creativity in this research project?
I think the question we need to ask first is what are we comparing our research with? It is well documented that the majority of research into the narrative of the veteran’s community are defined with the answers to questionnaires and surveys. What is lacking is narratives told in the veteran’s and family’s own words, known as the ‘life story’ approach. It is a method that is used across many other sections of society but not often within our community. Hence, the Military Afterlives project is unique in the sense that we give complete creative control to the veterans and families involved, enabling them to tell us their life story in their own way. We managed to involve 49 participants in this process. The use of life narrative methods was thus one of our primary creative tools to engage with this community. From this, I think the starting point I used in interviews was especially important. I always began with: ‘Tell me about your life in Civvie street’ and straight away, we were bridging a gap between researcher and participant through the use of service speak.
As we go into the next stage of our project, I think that using creativity becomes even more important. To engage in a dialogue about transition and the findings of the project with the veteran community, stakeholders, and policymakers, we have to present our research in an engaging and evocative way. The simple fact of the matter is our community does not read academic texts or attend conferences to see what going on in the veteran research world. Thus, I feel that using community-based creative methods, for example, workshops or knowledge exchange events would be worth exploring. It is about forging a better understanding between veterans/civilians and civilians/veterans, rather than a one-way street. Creative methods can give voice to both communities.
What change are you hoping to see as a result of this research?
I would like a redefining of what transition is so that it better reflects the lived experiences veterans have. I have no expectation for the MOD to change how they define transition or the way they frame it. My only suggestion for them is that they create a way for veterans to offer a ‘reality check’ to the service personnel who are leaving the military, about the realities of the civilian world they are just about to enter. Once you leave, you have no connection with the MOD as an organisation. You are now a veteran and you sit in the veteran community. This is where the transition starts, but not where it finishes. The individual experience of this is unique to the individual and their families.
The question for me is how do we, as a society, support a transitional process that can span a lifetime or might appear when some transitional experience brings the house of cards falling down. I strongly believe that the use of peer-to-peer support within local communities is the way forward. The employment of Armed Forces Covenant representatives who are veterans within local authorities would be able to bridge the gap between the local community, what support is available, and veterans and families within that community. It is not about privileging veterans because most of us ‘get on with it’. It is about bypassing all the barriers that we, veterans, experience.
Being a veteran researcher, what do you think are the challenges of conveying the research findings to an audience outside of the military community?
In my experience, as a researcher who uses creative, narrative and autoethnographic methods, there is always going to be a tension between the use of these methods to understand the veteran community and the ‘preferred’ methods that make up the current landscape of veteran research. To foreground different knowledge produced from creative research, there has to be a continuation of creative methods in any form of knowledge exchange. What the approaches that I utilise offer are different voices, evocative interactions, and an encouragement to engage with this knowledge differently.
That being said, my researcher’s journey has been fraught with difficulties over the last ten years. I often describe my presentation of research I am involved in as ‘standing on my soap box’. I do not think I am any different to other academics, and I have experienced the difficulties of finding one’s place in a new profession including imposter syndrome – those continual self-doubting conversations in your head as you find your niche. However, if I could give you five tips on how to be a creative researcher within the veterans research discourse I would say; have a passion and belief in what you are doing; continually rehearse answers to those difficult questions you might get asked for example in conferences; remember creative methods are not better or worse, they offer different knowledge; learn, reflect on and rehearse the answer to the ‘So What?’ question; ignore the doubters and embrace imposter syndrome and self-doubt as it is part of the journey towards realising ‘I know my stuff’.