Half a century after the CIA's Secret War in Laos—the largest bombing campaign in history—explosive remnants of war continue to be part of people's everyday lives. In Bomb Children Leah Zani offers a perceptive analysis of the long-term, often subtle, and unintended effects of massive air warfare. Zani traces the sociocultural impact of cluster submunitions—known in Laos as “bomb children”—through stories of explosives clearance technicians and others living and working in these old air strike zones. Zani presents her ethnography alongside poetry written in the field, crafting a startlingly beautiful analysis of state terror, authoritarian revival, rapid development, and ecological contamination. In so doing, she proposes that postwar zones are their own cultural and area studies, offering new ways to understand the parallel relationship between ongoing war violence and postwar revival.
- Cover
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Note on the Lao Language
- Fieldpoem 30: Postwar
- Introduction: The Fruit Eaters
- Fieldpoem 11: The Fruit Eaters
- 1. The Dragon and the River
- Fieldpoem 15: “The Rice Is More Delicious after Bomb Clearance"
- 2. Ghost Mine
- Fieldpoem 23: Blast Radius
- 3. Blast Radius
- Fieldpoem 26: House Blessings
- Conclusion: Phaseout
- Fieldpoem 18: Children
- Appendix: Notes on Fieldpoems
- References
- Index
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