Debating German Cultural Identity since 1989

Interdisciplinary views of the debates over and transformation of German cultural identity since unification.The events of 1989 and German unification were seismic historical moments. Although 1989 appeared to signify a healing of the war-torn history of the twentieth century, unification posed the question of German cultural identity afresh. Politicians, historians, writers, filmmakers, architects, and the wider public engaged in "memory contests" over such questions as the legitimacy of alternative biographies, West German hegemony, and the normalization of German history. This dynamic, contested, and still ongoing transformation of German cultural identity is the topic of this volume of new essays by scholars from the United Kingdom, Germany, the United States, and Ireland. It exploresGerman cultural identity by way of a range of disciplines including history, film studies, architectural history, literary criticism, memory studies, and anthropology, avoiding a homogenized interpretation. Charting the complex and often contradictory processes of cultural identity formation, the volume reveals the varied responses that continue to accompany the project of unification. Contributors: Pertti Ahonen, Aleida Assmann, Elizabeth Boa,Peter Fritzsche, Anne Fuchs, Deniz Göktürk, Kathleen James-Chakraborty, Anja K. Johannsen, Jennifer A. Jordan, Jürgen Paul, Linda Shortt, Andrew J. Webber. Anne Fuchs is Professor of German Literature at the University of St.Andrews, Scotland. Kathleen James-Chakraborty is Professor of Art History at University College Dublin, Ireland. Linda Shortt is Lecturer in German at Bangor University, Wales.

[T]he editors and contributors . . . have largely succeeded in their attempt to provide a fairly detailed overview of the current debates about what constitutes post-unification German cultural identity by covering a wide range of subjects from a variety of perspectives., Brings together work by a wide range of established international scholars, who offer strong, original takes on the subject of contemporary German memorial discourse. . . . These insightful essays provide compelling reading for those interested in contemporary Germany. Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

Kinda Shortt is Associate Professor at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on concepts of place, belonging, and attachment intwentieth- and twenty-first-century German-language literature and film. Significant publications in this area include: "Borders, Bordering,and Irregular Migration in Novels by Dorothee Elmiger and Olga Grjasnowa," MLR 116, no. 1 (2021): 134-52; and German Narrativesof Belonging: Writing Generation and Place in the Twenty-first Century (Oxford: Legenda, 2015). Kinda Shortt is Associate Professor at the University of Warwick. Her research focuses on concepts of place, belonging, and attachment intwentieth- and twenty-first-century German-language literature and film. Significant publications in this area include: "Borders, Bordering,and Irregular Migration in Novels by Dorothee Elmiger and Olga Grjasnowa," MLR 116, no. 1 (2021): 134-52; and German Narrativesof Belonging: Writing Generation and Place in the Twenty-first Century (Oxford: Legenda, 2015).