Welcome to the new home of the Military History Carnival

This is the main page for the Military History carnival, a monthly blog carnival which rounds up the best blog posts on the history of war, armed forces, and related topics, from ancient history up to the end of the 20th century. Our aim is neither to glorify nor condemn war, but to see it as an integral part of history which needs to be better understood.

Current edition: Military History and Warfare, 14th December.

Next edition: Host needed urgently - if you want to do it please get in touch. You can still submit posts using the submission form.

Hosts needed for: April 2009 onwards.

Blog Carnival page

What is a blog carnival?

A blog carnival is a collection of links to posts at other blogs, usually on a certain theme. It happens at a different blog every month (or whenever) and the owner of that blog acts as host, selecting posts to be included and putting it all together. Other people can suggest posts to be included, either their own or other people’s. It’s a good way of cross-promoting blogs, creating a sense of community in the blogosphere, and collecting the best posts on a particular topic.
What is the Military History Carnival all about?

“Military history” suggests different things to different people, but this carnival aims to be as inclusive as possible.

Military is defined very broadly. It includes all levels of armed conflict — there will be no rigid definition of what is and isn’t a war — and all military experiences during peacetime. At the risk of offending latin purists, it includes navies and air forces as well as armies. Weapons, tactics, strategy, uniforms, insignia, equipment etc are all interesting and important, and so are relationships between war and society, culture, race, gender, sexuality, disability, and the non-human. Preparations for and aftermaths of wars are as significant as the wars themselves. Opposition to war needs to be considered alongside the conduct of war. Representations of war in literature, films, TV, games etc are just as valid objects of study as empirical evidence of reality (although fictional representations should be related to the real world — no fictional universes please).

History is defined as the 20th century and earlier. This is an arbitrary limit intended to keep out polemic about current affairs. There are plenty of other places where you can argue about Iraq. Posts about events which happened after 1st January 2001 will not be included in any edition of this carnival. This restriction does not apply to historiography — posts about books published after that date are welcome, as long as the book itself is not about the 21st century. Posts on current or recent stories about things like memorialisation of past conflicts or treatment of veterans can also be included.

There will be no distinction between academic and non-academic, amateur and professional, or traditional and new. As long as your post is interesting, accessible, and within the scope of the carnival it will be considered.

Although you don’t have to be a qualified historian to be involved in the carnival, please make sure your posts meet some basic standards of proof. Arguments need to be backed up by evidence. This doesn’t mean that traditional methodology is privileged. If you’re capable of mounting a theoretically sophisticated challenge to the epistemological foundations of the empirical paradigm, you’re welcome. If you don’t know what that means, then just stick to the facts and you’ll be fine.
Can I get one of my posts included in it?

Yes, as long as it fits in and the host thinks it’s good enough. You can submit your own posts or posts by other people, but please don’t submit more than one post from the same blog by the same author. Posts must be within the scope described above and have been posted since the last edition of the carnival. You can submit links by e-mailing the host of the next edition, or by using the submission form. Hosts and dates of the next and previous editions are shown near the top of this page.

Posts should be more recent than the last edition of the carnival, as the idea is to showcase the best recent posts.

No more than 25% of the posts in one edition of the carnival should be about the same war. So far this limit hasn’t been reached so although there are lots of American Civil War blogs, we’d like to encourage more ACW bloggers to submit posts.
Can I host it?

Yes. As the carnival is hosted at a different blog every month, we always need more hosts to keep the carnival going. You don’t need advanced technical skills to be a host: as long as you know how to use e-mail and write a blog post you’ll be fine. Hosting a carnival is a good way to bring more readers into your blog. Host blogs don’t have to be exclusively or mainly about military history. Anyone who’s interested and committed can have a go. If you’d like to host, just leave a comment on this page, or e-mail me. Carnivals take place around the middle of the month, but the exact date is negotiable. Guidance notes for hosts are available here.

Host blogs must be written in English but posts in other languages can be considered at the host’s discretion.

Please only leave comments on this page if you’re offering to host, or if you’re the current host and you’re letting us know that you’ve posted the carnival.