(De)Colonizing Pictures?

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-140
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Struck
Keyword(s):  
Close Connection ◽  
German Empire ◽  
Postcolonial Criticism ◽  
German Colonialism

Over the last decade, an increasing number of documentaries and fictional films broadcast on German television has established an image of German colonialism that claims to be informed by postcolonial criticism but, as I argue in this article, often resembles the image created by colonialism itself. Das Weltreich der Deutschen (The Global German Empire, 2010), a documentation produced by Guido Knopp, serves as an example for the close connection between practices of representation and colonial fantasies, and demonstrates how the combination of entertainment and education obscures the fact that colonialism has been not only a practice of political domination and economical exploitation, but also a practice of representation.

Ferdinand Oyono's Flüchtige Spur Tundi Ondua and Germany's Cameroon

PMLA ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 128 (1) ◽  
pp. 142-148
Author(s):  
Volker Langbehn
Keyword(s):  
Historical Context ◽  
Political Activism ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Colonial History ◽  
German Empire ◽  
German Colonialism ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
German Publisher ◽  
The Many

Almost anyone who reads ferdinand oyono's une vie de boy (1956) in any language will conclude that the novel focuses on French colonialism. But is it only about colonialism by the French? An analysis of the many German resonances throughout the text—as well as an engagement with the German translation of Une vie de boy—suggests that it is about much more. Oyono's Une vie de boy enables the reader to reflect on Europan colonialism more broadly beyond the role of France. The novel offers a lens onto Germany's colonial history because Cameroon was a former colonial “protectorate” of the German empire. This historical context, therefore, places Une vie de boy in both national and transnational contexts. While my reading addresses possible connections or similarities between French and German colonialism, the publication in German itself adds an important layer to the understanding of Une vie de boy in Germany. In consideration of the political activism of the novel's German publisher, Johann (Hans) Fladung (1898-1982), the publication of Oyono's novel can be read as a criticism of German historiography in the 1950s, which frequently avoided Germany's colonial history, a history that has been linked with the crimes of the Holocaust (Zimmerer).

The First Postcolonial Nation in Europe? The End of the German Empire

2018 ◽  
pp. 101-122
Author(s):  
Andreas Eckert
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Third World ◽  
The Other ◽  
World War ◽  
German Empire ◽  
The Third ◽  
German Colonialism ◽  
Imperial Expansion ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Third World

Contrasting the ‘early’ decolonization imposed on defeated Germany after World War I with the subsequent creation of a Nazi Empire, dismantled after years of war and occupation, this chapter examines what made Germany’s twentieth century colonialism and its aftermath so different. It briefly points out why historians and politicians have ignored or downplayed Germany’s colonial past. It then looks at the variety of ways in which colonialism shaped interwar Germany and also discusses to what extent the Nazi Empire needs to be placed within the history of German colonialism, broadly defined. It also analyses how Germany shaped and was shaped by the end of the other European empires and the emergence of the ‘Third World’. In addition to the obvious consideration of ideological motivation, it also investigates the depth of popular support for imperial expansion and the ways in which Germany’s loss of empire has been articulated and understood.

Anatolia as a site of German colonial desire and national re-awakenings

2009 ◽  
Vol 41 ◽  
pp. 117-150
Author(s):  
Malte Fuhrmann
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
Federal Republic Of Germany ◽  
Mutual Benefit ◽  
Turkish Republic ◽  
German Empire ◽  
German Colonialism ◽  
Turkish Nationalism ◽  
A Site ◽  
Agricultural Settlement

AbstractAnatolia played an important role in German nineteenth-century colonial aspirations that was subsequently blacked out in both the Federal Republic of Germany and the Turkish Republic, due to their political re-orientation. To recreate the important role that Anatolia played in German colonialism, classic approaches to the studies of imperialism, such as tracing government actions through official documentation, are insufficient. This approach must be combined with a close reading of consular archives, travelogues, propaganda leaflets, and personal letters, in order to ascertain correctly the dissemination of motives underlying the Germans' actions in nineteenth-century Anatolia. Based on this approach, one can differentiate between three different roles that Anatolia played in German colonial thoughts and deeds: as an untouched land destined for agricultural settlement; as a source of inspiration for the German Empire to reshape itself in the image of ancient Pergamon; and as a site where German colonialism and Turkish nationalism could cooperate to their mutual benefit.

Water, Sand, Molluscs: Imperial Infrastructures, the Age of Hydrology, and German Colonialism in Swakopmund, Southwest Africa, 1884-1915

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-206
Author(s):  
Martin Kalb
Keyword(s):  
Environmental History ◽  
Entry Point ◽  
German Empire ◽  
German Colonialism ◽  
The Town ◽  
Coastal Settlement ◽  
Southwest Africa

How did nature challenge German colonialism in Southwest Africa? What role did water, sand, and a small mollusc play as Germans tried to establish their first and, in many ways, only settler colony? This paper explores the events surrounding the town of Swakopmund, a small coastal settlement defined as the main entry point (Eingangstur) into German Southwest Africa at the time. As a case study, Swakopmund arguably provides an excellent framework when showcasing the importance of widely underestimated environmental protagonists in the construction of the German Empire; it also underlines the value of incorporating environmental history more broadly into discussions of German colonial fantasies in the age of hydrology.

Introduction

1978 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 543-544
Author(s):  
W. Bernard
Keyword(s):  
Molecular Weight ◽  
Electron Microscope ◽  
Nucleic Acid ◽  
Gene Mapping ◽  
Molecular Genetics ◽  
Cell Biology ◽  
Gene Activity ◽  
Close Connection ◽  
Basic Information ◽  
Simple Systems

In comparison to many other fields of ultrastructural research in Cell Biology, the successful exploration of genes and gene activity with the electron microscope in higher organisms is a late conquest. Nucleic acid molecules of Prokaryotes could be successfully visualized already since the early sixties, thanks to the Kleinschmidt spreading technique - and much basic information was obtained concerning the shape, length, molecular weight of viral, mitochondrial and chloroplast nucleic acid. Later, additonal methods revealed denaturation profiles, distinction between single and double strandedness and the use of heteroduplexes-led to gene mapping of relatively simple systems carried out in close connection with other methods of molecular genetics.

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