German National Identity after the HolocaustISBN: 978-0-7456-1045-0
Paperback
256 pages
August 1999, Polity
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These questions dogged public debates in both East and West Germany
in the long period of division. Both states officially claimed to
have "overcome the past" more effectively than the other; both
sought to construct new, opposing identities as the "better
Germany". But, in different ways, official claims ran at odds with
the kaleidoscope of popular collective memories; dissonances,
sensitivities and taboos were the order of the day on both sides of
the Wall. And in the 1990s, with continued heated debates over past
and present, it was clear that inner unity appeared to be no
automatic consequence of formal unification.
Drawing on a wide range of material - from landscapes of memory and
rituals of commemoration, through private diaries, oral history
interviews and public opinion poll surveys, to the speeches of
politicians and the writings of professional historians - Fulbrook
provides a clear analysis of key controversies, events and patterns
of historical and national consciousness in East and West Germany
in equal depth.
Arguing against "essentialist" conceptions of the nation, Fulbrook
presents a theory of the nation as a constructed community of
shared legacy and common destiny, and shows how the conditions for
the easy construction of any such identity have been notably
lacking in Germany after the Holocaust.
This book will be of interest to advanced undergraduate and
postgraduate students in history, politics, and German and European
Studies, as well as established scholars and interested members of
the public.