DEFENSE LANGUAGE

Photography: Claire Beckett

The photographs in Claire Beckett’s Defense Language series features costumed role-players, intricate Hollywood-style sets, and staged scenes on military bases throughout the United States. Between 2006 and 2023, Beckett embedded herself on these bases to examine how Arabs and Muslims were represented during counterinsurgency training for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Those shown in the photographs include military personnel who were often combat veterans acting as enemy combatants, and immigrants from Iraq or Afghanistan who were brought in to increase the realism within the exercises. The images range from formal portraits and landscapes of improvised, constructed environments to more candid moments of individuals interacting within the training scenarios.