Troubling Memories?: The German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. and the Memory of the Holocaust
The recognition politics of German-American activists and
their ethnic organizations have been marked by significant successes since the late 1980s. The opening of the German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. (GAHM) in Washington, D.C. in 2010
is a symptom and continuation of these intensified visibility politics
aimed at raising the symbolic capital of German-American ethnicity.
By closely examining the representations of National Socialism and
the Second World War in the GAHM’s permanent exhibition and its
wider cultural programs, including its temporary exhibitions, this paper sheds light on the museum’s problematic memory politics which
stand in direct competition with the one pursued by the nearby United
States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Whereas attempts at confronting the German National Socialist past have been intensified by the
museum’s leadership in more recent years, the existence of pro-Nazi
German-American groups still remains silenced in the museum. German-American identity politics and the dynamics of Holocaust memory are intricately interrelated, I argue, with the latter not impeding but,
paradoxically, rather catalyzing the former’s strength.
___
- “About the Museum.” United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. 14
Aug. 2019
- “About Us.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. 14
Aug. 2019
- “A Celebration of 40 Years: German-American Heritage Foundation of the U.S.A. of GAHM.” Special Edition. The Ambassador / Der Botschafter 2017.
- Anderson, Benedict R. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (rev. and extended ed.). London: Verso, 1991.
- A Night at the Garden. Dir. Marshall Curry. Field of Vision, 2017. Film. “Another Reading.” Media Report VDAK/USA Vol. II No. 1 (March 1986), p. 3. GHS Archives 293b. MS 536/Container 6. German American Heritage Society of Greater Washington, D.C.
- Assheuer, Thomas. “Deutsches Reinemachen.” Die ZEIT 26 Febr.
2009. 14 Aug. 2019
- Assmann, Aleida “Konstruktion von Geschichte in Museen.” APuZ Auf Politik und Zeitgeschichte 49 (2007): 6-13.
- Assmann, Jan. “Kollektives Gedächtnis und kulturelle Identität.” Kultur und Gedächtnis. Eds. Jan Assmann and Tonio Hölscher. Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp, 1988. 9-19.
- Bierich, Nora. “Kulturpornografie, Holo-Kitsch und Revisionismus. Der Vorleser kommt ins Kino.” Zeitgeschichte-online. Febr.
- 2009. 14 Aug. 2019
- Conzen, Kathleen N., et al. “The Invention of Ethnicity: A Perspective from the U.S.A.” Journal of American Ethnic History 12.1 (1992): 3-41.
- Diamond, Sander S. The Nazi Movement in the United States, 1924 - 1941. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1974.
- Doerner, Andreas. Politischer Mythos und symbolische Politik. Der Hermannmythos: zur Entstehung des Nationalbewusstseins der Deutschen. Reinbek b. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1996.
- Dreyer, Boris. Arminius und der Untergang des Varus. Warum die Germanen keine Römer wurden. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2009.
- Eder, Jacob. Holocaust Angst: The Federal Republic of Germany and American Holocaust Memory since the 1970s. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2016.
- Feldman, Lily Gardner. Germany’s Foreign Policy of Reconciliation: From Enmity to Amity. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2012.
- Fisher, Marc. “German-American Heritage Museum promotes culture,
doesn’t tell whole story.” The Washington Post 20 March 2010.
26 Sept. 2018
- “Four Decades of Marlene Dietrich.” German-American Heritage Foundation of the U.S.A. 28 March 2018. E-mail.
- “History.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. 14 Aug.
2019
- “History of DANK.” German-American National Congress. 14 Aug.
2019
- “Germans in Exile: Forced Emigration During the Third Reich.” 2010. Information panel. German-American Heritage Center, U.S.A.
- Glazer, Nathan and Daniel P. Moynihan. Introduction. Ethnicity: Theory and Experience. Eds. Glazer and Moynihan. 3rd ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1975.
- Grow, Ansgar. “Reif furs Museum: Amerikas deutsches Erbe,” Die
WELT, 21 Aug. 2011, 26 Sept. 2018
- Hobbie, Margaret. Museums, Sites and Collections of Germanic Culture in North America. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1980.
- House Concurrent Resolution 89. Recognizing the Hermann Monument and Hermann Heights Park in New Ulm, Minnesota as a National Symbol of the Contributions of Americans of German Heritage.106th Cong., 2nd sess. Enrolled Bill. Passed/agreed to in Senate 5 Oct. 2000. Washington: GPO, 2000.
- “Indoctrination.” Media Report VDAK/USA Vol. III No. 1 (April 1987), p. 4. GHS Archives 625. MS 536/Container 6. German American Heritage Society of Greater Washington, D.C.
- Jacobson, Matthew Frye. Roots Too: White Ethnic Revival in Post-Civil Rights America. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 2008.
- Judgment at Nuremberg (1961). Dir. Stanley Kramer. MGM/UA Home Video, 1996. Film.
- Klingst, Martin. “Alles außer Lederhosen,” ZEIT Online 29 Apr. 2010.
26 Sept. 2018
- Koch, Nathaniel. “In Chinatown, the spirit of German immigrants,”
The Washington Post 3 Aug. 2017. 26 Sept. 2018
- Lange, Julia. “German-American Heritage Museums and the Representation of the World Wars: A case study of the DANK Haus Museum in Chicago (IL),” Yearbook of German-American Studies 54 (2019).
- —. ’Herman the German’: Das Hermann Monument in der deutschamerikanischen Erinnerungskultur. Münster: LIT, 2013.
- —. “How to Cope with it? The Steuben Society of America and the Holocaust.” Disturbing Pasts: Reverberations of the Second World War in Europe after 1945. Ed. Mary Fulbrook, Julia Wagner and Christiane Wienand. London, Bloomsbury, 2015.
- “Lawyers Without Rights: Jewish Lawyers in Germany under the Third Reich.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. Washington, D.C. 2016. Exhibition.
- “Mission.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. 14 Aug.
2019
- “Museum.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. 14
Aug. 2019
- Novak, Michael. The Rise of the Unrentable Ethnics. New York, Macmillan, 1972.
- Novick, Peter. The Holocaust in American Life. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Comp., 1999.
- Nowhere in Africa. Directed by Caroline Link. MTM Medien & Television/Munich, 2001. Film.
- “Partners in Leadership.” 2010. Information Panel. German-American Heritage Center, Washington, D.C.
- “Peter Thiel Honored at the 32nd Annual Council of 1000 Award and
Fundraising Gala.” German-American Heritage Museum of the
U.S.A. 14 Aug. 2019
- “Reminder: Jewish German War Veterans Lecture with John Friedman and Oliver Moss this Thursday.” German-American Heritage Foundation of the U.S.A. 2 Oct. 2016. E-mail.
- Roth, Martin and Gilbert Lupfer. “Museen.” Gedächtnis und Erinnerung. Ein interdisziplinäres Handbuch. Eds. Christian Gudehus, Ariane Eichenberg, and Harald Welzer. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2010. 171-6.
- Schmitz, Gregor Peter. “Deutsches Museum in Washington. Ick war
ein Berliner,” Spiegel Online 30 March 2010, 26 Sept. 2018
- Schuldiner, Michael. Contesting Histories: German and Jewish Americans and the Legacy of the Holocaust. Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech UP, 2011.
- “Site History.” Landis Valley Museum. 14 Aug. 2019
- Stone, Alan A. “Forgetting the Holocaust.” Boston Review 6 Jan. 2014,
14 Aug. 2019
- The Book Thief. Dir. Brian Percival. 20th Century Fox, 2013. Film.
- The General (Die Akte General). Dir. Stephan Wagner. Screenplay by Alex Buresch. UFA Fiction in co-production with ARD Degeto Film, BR Bayerischer Rundfunk, SR – Saarlaendischer Rundfunk, SWR Suedwestrundfunk, 2015. Film.
- The Reader. Dir. Stephen Daldry. Screenplay by David Hare. The Weinstein Company, 2008. Film.
- Tolzmann, Don Heinrich. German-Americana. Selected Essays (Milford, OH: Little Miami Pub. Co., 2009).
“Welcome.” German-American Heritage Museum of the U.S.A. 14
Aug. 2019
- Wilhelm, Cornelia. Bewegung oder Verein? Nationalsozialistische Volkstumspolitik in den USA. Stuttgart: Steiner, 1998.
- Winter, Jay. “The Generation of Memory: Reflections on the ‘Memory Boom’ in Contemporary Historical Studies,” GHI Bulletin 27 (Fall 2000): 69-92.
- ISSN: 1300-6606
- Başlangıç: 1995
- Yayıncı: -