Postcolonial Germany

At the end of the First World War, Germany appeared to have lost everything: the lives of millions of soldiers and civilians, control over borderland territories, and, above all, a sense of national self-worth in the international political arena. But it also lost almost three million square kilometres of land overseas in the form of colonies and concessions in Africa, China, and the Pacific. Allied powers declared Germany unfit to rule over overseas populations, and it was forcibly decolonized. It thus became the first 'postcolonial' European nation that had participated in the 'new imperialism' of the modern era. The end of colonialism was the beginning of a memory culture that has been remarkably long-lived and dynamic. Postcolonial Germany traces the evolution of the collective memory of German colonialism, stretching from the loss of the colonies across the eras of National Socialism, national division, and the Cold War to the present day. It shows to what extent this memory was intimately bound to objects of material culture in the former colonial metropole, such as tropical fruit sold at colonial balls, state gifts handed to the former colonies at independence, and ethnological items kept as family heirlooms. The study draws on a wide range of sources, including popular literature, oral history, and previously unexplored archival holdings. It marks an important shift in historical methodology, considering the significance of both material culture and private memories in constructing accounts of the past. Above all, it raises important questions about the public responsibilities of postcolonial nations and governments in Europe and their relationship to the private legacies of colonialism. Britta Schilling has produced a highly readable and informative study, which is at once breathtaking in scope and swift in style, especially for a doctoral thesis. Effortlessly, she takes the reader through almost a century of German history and memory production without succumbing to superficiality or truisms. Instead, she carefully evaluates the evidence at her disposal and provides a fresh approach to historical memory studies by focusing on material culture and the complicated interplay of public and private memory. Her combination of historical scholarship with insights from anthropology and cultural studies ... deserves great merit. Fabian Krautwald, H-Soz-u-Kult Her [Schilling's] in-depth study is a most valuable contribution to the development of the vital field of the memory of German colonialism and will doubtless trigger further research. Dr Monika Albrecht, Reviews in HistoryIntroduction: The Fall of Colonialism and the Rise of Memory ; 1. The 'Africa-Book', 1915-1925 ; 2. Colonial Wares, 'Blacks', and Jazz at the Colonial Ball, 1925-1935 ; 3. The Schoolbook, 1935-1945 ; 4. The State Gift, 1949-1968 ; 5. The Empty Plinth, 1968-1990 ; 6. The Family Heirloom: Private Memories of Colonialism ; Conclusion ; Bibliography