Imperialist air war: East German academic research and memory politics reflected in the work of Olaf Groehler

Authors
Publication date 2011
Host editors
  • H. Schmitz
  • A. Seidel-Arpacı
Book title Narratives of trauma: discourses of German wartime suffering in national and international perspectives
ISBN
  • 9789042033191
Series German monitor, 73
Pages (from-to) 33-58
Publisher Amsterdam [etc.]: Rodopi
Organisations
  • Faculty of Humanities (FGw) - Amsterdam Institute for Humanities Research (AIHR)
Abstract This chapter analyses the work of GDR historians on the air war and the Allied bombing campaign, particularly the work of Olaf Groehler, the leading GDR expert on the air war. The chapter situates Groehler's work within official GDR memory politics and explores Groehler's work as an attempt to distance himself from both the dominant SED narrative as well as West German apologetic tendencies. It argues, however, that Groehler ultimately remained within the parameters of a GDR 'victim discourse' by shifting German responsibility onto 'fascist imperialism', or AngloAmerican imperialism.
Document type Chapter
Language English
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