Wittman is an associate professor of French and Italian and primarily works on 19th- and 20th-century Italian and French literature from a comparative perspective. She discusses how the monuments broke with previous memorials of its era and how their meaning has evolved over time, including among some soldiers who identify with the monuments because they feel that their own sacrifices and services have gone unrecognized by wider society. On the centennial of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier’s dedication, Wittman, who is the author of The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Modern Mourning, and the Reinvention of the Mystical Body (University of Toronto Press, 2011), reflects on how the concept of taking a single, anonymous body, recovered from the frontline and given a formal burial, became a widespread approach to recognize the concrete cost of modern warfare. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, Arlington National Cemetery, was dedicated on this date 100 years ago.
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