Battle scarred: an ethnographer at Camp Bastion

“Whatever important purpose we academics are meant to serve,” he says, “what we do will make fuck-all difference to the world.” Priceless. I will remind some of my colleagues of this. They won't listen, however.

Fuck-all difference? We might say that raising awareness is a difference in itself. Reading your work has raised my awareness of the experiences of some of my fellow human beings. The same will be true of other readers. That is a difference. Your work might be just one tributary, but that is true of any voice for change. Eventually, they all merge into one river. And that might change something.