Vietnam - the television war

 The power of Television

It is often said that the Vietnam War was the first television war - it was televised into our lounge rooms, and for the first time the community, young and old could see what war was really about. As a result, there was considerable resistance from sections of the community as the war dragged on, and the images of suffering and death continued to be seen on television screens in Australia. 

Interestingly, no war since Vietnam has had the same coverage in so much detail. Compared to the censorship in other wars, including World War 1, the coverage was extensive and very real. 

It is worth reading the writings and viewing the photojournalism of famous Vietnam war photographers such as the Australian Neil Davis to get an idea about how close the coverage was to the real action.

As a result of the images captured and stories told about the war, the home front was informed about the nature of war more than ever before. You may wonder if World War 1 and World War 2 would have played out differently if we had television when they occurred?

There are many great documentaries on Vietnam for you to look at and consider - some quite controversial as we continue to the write the history of the Vietnam War. 

For those of you who really want to immerse yourself in the Vietnam War, the series called The Vietnam War: A Film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick is pretty amazing. To watch it all is a bit of a marathon (10 episodes @ 1 hour 20 minutes) and very intense but a wonderful documentary of the events and things we will talk about and see in Vietnam. Please note that there is a cost to watch the series on Amazon and iTunes, and it is a big ask to watch it all, but worth a look if you choose.

Starting to put the Vietnam War into place

Chronological sequencing of the Vietnam War

In this post you will find below selected websites that provide timelines for the Vietnam War. 

From now on, you will be forwarded via this blog small bits of information on a regular basis (about once a week) for you to look at prior to the trip. 

If you do the readings/watching in the blog between now and April, you will have a really good understanding of what you are visiting when we are in Vietnam. 

We know you have plenty of schoolwork to do, but if we do a little bit at a time in preparation for the tour, you will certainly be well briefed on the Vietnam War and associated aspects for our visit.

There is no test or assessment of all this reading/watching, just a chance for you to get the most out of the tour! Many of you are also doing your own reading in preparation - keep that going, but just keep an eye out for what is posted to see if it provides information that you have not covered.

Other than keeping a journal on the trip, there will not be any worksheets or workbooks for you - this blog preparation is really that! Plus, we don't want your heads buried in booklets or filling in sheets when we are traveling - we much prefer you to look around and take it all in, using the knowledge and understandings about Vietnam the country and the Vietnam War you gain prior to the trip.

The chronological sequencing of events is a fundamental skill in history, and this blog posting provides several timelines of events (for the American involvement and the Australian involvement in the Vietnam War). Such sequencing gives you an orientation of what happened over time - it is so important to get your historical bearings on happenings with any historical event - to know what happened in order. Probably not the most exciting historical task but very important when considering cause and effect. 

American involvement timelines

http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/vietnam/timeline.htm

Australian involvement timelines

http://www.vvaa.org.au/calendar.htm

https://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/vietnam

 

Short video from the ceremony

 

Award ceremony

At the Torrens Parade Grounds Room on 6 November 2023, the 2023 Premier's Anzac Spirit School Prize students were presented with their medallions and certificates by the Premier, the Honourable Peter Malinauskas MP. It was a great ceremony for the 2023 awardees and the 2022 awardees did us proud by hosting the ceremony and presenting on the recently completed April 2023 study tour to Darwin.

Here is a selection of images taken by the professional photographer we contracted for the ceremony. Some great photographs!