East German Socialist Modernity and Consumer Culture Before and After the Wall

Sep 17, 2009

Lecture at the GHI | Katherine Pence (Baruch College New York, NY) | Lecture Series: DDR - Was bleibt? East German Legacies in German History

With the fall of the Berlin Wall twenty years ago and the subsequent union of both Germanys, the German Democratic Republic ceased to exist as a state. Culturally, however, the GDR remains a presence in contemporary Germany. There has been a steady flow of books and movies about eastern German memory and identity amid discussion of Easterners' Ostalgie. Historians debate the place of the GDR in the larger sweep of German history. Even in political and social debate, the GDR continues to have an impact on united Germany through the presence of the Left Party, which has its roots in part in East Germany's ruling communist party.

The existence of the GDR had an impact on the self-perception of the Federal Republic during the Cold War and in some respects it still does so today. The question, then, as Germany celebrates the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall is not "Why did the GDR fail?" but rather "Was bleibt? What remains?"

Fall Lecture Series 2009


DDR - Was bleibt? East German Legacies in German History

Organized by Uta Balbier und Ines Prodöhl

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  • East German Socialist Modernity and Consumer Culture Before and After the Wall
    September 17, 2009
    Katherine Pence (Baruch College)
    • Popular Culture, Memory, and German Unification: Heiner Carow's "The Mistake"
      October 05, 2009
      Barton Byg (University of Massachusetts Amherst)
      Please note: The lecture will take place at the Goethe Institut Washington DC (directions)
    • Afterlives: On the Resonance of Vanished German States (Prussia, Weimar, the Third Reich, the GDR)
      October 15, 2009
      Charles S. Maier (Harvard University)
    • Shoelaces, Fishing Manuals, and the Fear of Misspeaking
      November 05, 2009
      Katrin Askan (Berlin)
    • 'Was it really meant to be this way'? Unification and the Remaking of German Party Politics
      December 03, 2009
      Daniel Hough (University of Sussex)