Germany's Transient Pasts

2000-11-09 History

Author : Rudy J. Koshar
Release : 2000-11-09
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 622/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Germany's Transient Pasts by : Rudy J. Koshar

Download or read book Germany's Transient Pasts written by Rudy J. Koshar. This book was released on 2000-11-09. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the course of the twentieth century, Germans have venerated and maintained a variety of historical buildings--from medieval fortresses and cathedrals to urban districts and nineteenth-century working-class housing. But the practice of historic preservation has sometimes proven controversial, as different groups of Germans have sought to use historical architecture to represent competing versions of their nation's history. Transient Pasts is the first book to examine the role that the historic preservation movement has played in German cultural history and memory from the end of the nineteenth century to the early 1970s. Focusing on key public debates over historic preservation, Rudy Koshar charts a trajectory of cultural politics in which historical architecture both facilitated and limited Germans' efforts to identify as a nation. He demonstrates that historical buildings and monuments have served as enduring symbols of national history in a country scarred by the traumas of two world wars, Nazism, the Holocaust, and political division. His findings challenge both the widely accepted argument that Germans have constantly repressed their past and the contention that Germany's intense public engagement with history since reunification is unprecedented.

From Monuments to Traces

2000-07-18 History

Author : Rudy Koshar
Release : 2000-07-18
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 683/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis From Monuments to Traces by : Rudy Koshar

Download or read book From Monuments to Traces written by Rudy Koshar. This book was released on 2000-07-18. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rudy Koshar constructs a powerful framework in which to examine the subject of German collective memory, which for more than a half century has been shaped by the experience of Nazism, World War II, and the Holocaust. Finding the assumptions of many writers and scholars shortsighted, Koshar surveys the evidence of postwar German memory in the context of previous traditions. From Monuments to Traces follows the evolution of German "memory landscapes" all the way from national unification in 1870-71 through the world wars and political division to reunification in 1990. The memory landscapes of any society may incorporate monuments, historical buildings, memorials and cemeteries, battlefields, streets, or natural environments that foster shared memories of important events or personalities. They may also be designed to divert public attention from embarrassing or traumatic histories. Koshar argues that in Germany, memory landscapes have taken shape according to four separate paradigms--the national monument, the ruin, the reconstruction, and the trace--which he analyzes in relation to the changing political agendas that have guided them over time. Despite the massive ruptures of Germany's history, we see that significant continuities have served to counterbalance the traumas of the German past.

Germany's Ancient Pasts

2018-11-27 History

Author : Brent Maner
Release : 2018-11-27
Genre : History
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 10X/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Germany's Ancient Pasts by : Brent Maner

Download or read book Germany's Ancient Pasts written by Brent Maner. This book was released on 2018-11-27. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Germany, Nazi ideology casts a long shadow over the history of archaeological interpretation. Propaganda, school curricula, and academic publications under the regime drew spurious conclusions from archaeological evidence to glorify the Germanic past and proclaim chauvinistic notions of cultural and racial superiority. But was this powerful and violent version of the distant past a nationalist invention or a direct outcome of earlier archaeological practices? By exploring the myriad pathways along which people became familiar with archaeology and the ancient past—from exhibits at local and regional museums to the plotlines of popular historical novels—this broad cultural history shows that the use of archaeology for nationalistic pursuits was far from preordained. In Germany’s Ancient Pasts, Brent Maner offers a vivid portrait of the development of antiquarianism and archaeology, the interaction between regional and national history, and scholarly debates about the use of ancient objects to answer questions of race, ethnicity, and national belonging. While excavations in central Europe throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries fed curiosity about the local landscape and inspired musings about the connection between contemporary Germans and their “ancestors,” antiquarians and archaeologists were quite cautious about using archaeological evidence to make ethnic claims. Even during the period of German unification, many archaeologists emphasized the local and regional character of their finds and treated prehistory as a general science of humankind. As Maner shows, these alternative perspectives endured alongside nationalist and racist abuses of prehistory, surviving to offer positive traditions for the field in the aftermath of World War II. A fascinating investigation of the quest to turn pre- and early history into history, Germany’s Ancient Pasts sheds new light on the joint sway of science and politics over archaeological interpretation.

From Monuments to Traces

2000 Architecture

Author : Rudy Koshar
Release : 2000
Genre : Architecture
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 525/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis From Monuments to Traces by : Rudy Koshar

Download or read book From Monuments to Traces written by Rudy Koshar. This book was released on 2000. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text constructs a framework in which to examine the subject of German collective memory, which for more than half a century has been shaped by the experience of Nazism, World War II and the Holocaust. Beginning with national unification in 1870-71 it follows through to reunification in 1990.

Munich and Memory

2000 Architecture

Author : Gavriel David Rosenfeld
Release : 2000
Genre : Architecture
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 106/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Munich and Memory by : Gavriel David Rosenfeld

Download or read book Munich and Memory written by Gavriel David Rosenfeld. This book was released on 2000. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In the ever-growing scholarship on German memory after World War II, there is nothing comparable to Rosenfeld's impressively researched account of one city's attempt to 'master' the past through reconstruction." --Rudy Koshar, author of "Germany's Transient Pasts" "In his fascinating history of Munich's postwar architectural reconstruction and social de-Nazification, Gavriel Rosenfeld shows how closely linked the clearing of both rubble and rabble from the German landscape were, and how closely Germany's postwar architectural landscape came to resemble its new democratic mindset." --James E. Young, author of "The Texture of Memory"

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