Anke Pinkert explores films produced in the Soviet Occupation Zone and East Germany from the end of World War II through the early 1960s, offering new insights into how Germans dealt with the aftermath of the war. In her cultural analysis of the relationship between modern historical violence, cultural memory, and cinematic representation, Pinkert argues that the cinematic productions of East Germany offer a corrective to misperceptions about German responses to the legacy of the war.

Film and Memory in East Germany considers antifascist films of the immediate postwar period, which depict the reintegration of former soldiers into society and the crisis of masculinity that accompanied the aftermath of the war; the socialist films of the late 1940s and 1950s, which attempt to shape a new national imaginary through stories of exemplary socialist womanhood; and, finally, the cinematic return to 1945 in socialist modernist films of the 1960s.

Rethinks the politics of public memory in East German film

About the Author

Anke Pinkert is Assistant Professor of German and Cinema Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has published on postwar German literature, film, and cultural history in German Quarterly, Seminar, and Germanic Review.

Reviews

[F]or advanced scholars in the fields of film history and cultural theory Pinkert's study opens up a range of new and important perspectives. 27. 4 2009

* German History *

Film and Memory in East Germany is an important addition to the literature in this rapidly growing area of investigation for a number of reasons. . . . This is an excellent study and will be required reading for all students and scholars of this period in German film history.Spring 2010

* Slavic Review *

. . . These accounts give rise to new psychoanalytical approaches to the study of post-WW II German cultural identity and East German film. The book concludes with a critical reexamination of altered patterns of loss after the collapse of communism. A good resource for those interested in film (East German in particular) and trauma studies. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates, researchers, faculty, and professionals. -ChoiceMay 2009

-- B.Tautz * Bowdoin College *

These accounts give rise to new psychoanalytical approaches to the study of post-WW II German cultural identity and East German film. . . . A good resource for those interested in film (East German in particular) and trauma studies.May 2009

* Choice *



Book Information
ISBN 9780253219671
Author Anke Pinkert
Format Paperback
Page Count 288
Imprint Indiana University Press
Publisher Indiana University Press
Weight(grams) 458g