Weimar Colonialism

This volume examines aspects of the German colonial consciousness following the end of empire in 1918. Entirely stripped of colonial possessions under the Treaty of Versailles, Germany, unlike other European nations, was faced with the end of empire well before the end of the European colonial project. This loss left behind a complex legacy that permeated the political, literary and cultural discourses of the postwar period. By scrutinising the resonances between literary intervention and public discourses, and between their respective agendas and methods, the contributors tease out the intricacies of the colonial debate in Weimar Germany. Weimar revanchism is unveiled as an attempt to salve a humiliated national ego and refashion Germany as a model agent of the ‘civilising mission’ in colonial space against the backdrop of military defeat, political collapse and foreign occupation. The contributions also highlight the framing of Eastern European and Near Eastern space as colonial, the complex mediality of colonial debate and the lasting political and literary legacy of “Weimar Colonialism”.

Inhalt: Florian Krobb and Elaine Martin Introduction: Coloniality in Post-Imperial Culture Heidrun Käemper Linguistic Representations of Colonialism as an Ideological-Discursive Construction in the Early Weimar Republic Elaine Martin “Die Bestien im Lande”. Converging Discourses in the ‘Black Shame’ Campaign Catherine Repussard ‘Back to the Wild’. Ambivalences of Colonial Education during the Weimar Period in Deutsche Jugend und Deutsche Kolonien (1932) Stefan Hermes Colonising the Mind: Inverted Literary Mimicry in Hans Grimm’s Novella Der Pavian (1930) Brett M. Van Hoesen Re-staging Genocide. Popular Press Photomontage and the Culture of Forgetting in the Age of Weimar Postcolonialism Hinnerk Onken “Südamerika; Ein Zukunftsland der Menschheit”. Colonial Imagination and Photographs from South America in Weimar Germany Florian Krobb “Doch das orientalische ist es ja eben, was uns interessiert”. Colonial Desires and Ottoman Space War Memoirs as Post-Colonial Discourse Kristin Kopp The Weimar ‘Drang nach Osten’. Colonial Depictions of Poland in German Interwar Literature Jason Verber Remembering at a Time of Forgetting. Weimar Colonialism in West Germany Dirk Goettsche Memory and Critique of Weimar Colonialism in Contemporary German Literature