Culture of the German Democratic Republic
Encyclopedia
The Culture of East Germany varied throughout the years due to the political and historical events that took place in the 20th century, especially as a result of Nazism
and Communism
. A reflection on the history of arts and culture in East Germany reveals complex relationships between artists and the state, between oppositional and conformist art. In a short four decades, East Germany developed a distinct culture and produced works of literature, film, visual arts, music, and theatre of international acclaim.
'. This was intended to depict everyday life under Socialism in a way that showed the benefits of living and working in East Germany.
The Puhdys
and Karat were popular mainstream bands, managing to hint at critical thoughts in their lyrics without being explicit. Like most mainstream acts, they appeared in popular youth magazines such as Neues Leben and Magazin.
Influences from the West were heard everywhere, because TV and radio that came from the Klassenfeind (enemy of the working class) could be received in many parts of the East, too (a notorious exception being Dresden
, with its geographically disadvantageous position in the Elbe
valley, giving it the nickname of “Valley of the Clueless” despite some Western radio being available). The Western influence led to the formation of more "underground" groups with a decisively western-oriented sound. A few of these bands were Die Skeptiker
, as well as Feeling B
.
was born in East German territory, and spent a great deal of money converting his house in Eisenach into a museum
of his life, which, among other things, included more than 300 instruments
from Bach's life. In 1980 this museum was receiving more than 70,000 visitors annually.
In Leipzig
, an enormous archive
with recordings of all of Bach's music was compiled, along with many historical document
s and letters both to and from him. Werner Neumann
founded the Bach-Archiv Leipzig
in 1950.
Every other year, school children from across East Germany gathered for a Bach competition held in East Berlin
. Every four years an international Bach competition for keyboard
and strings
was held.
, who brought back a lot of artists from the antifascist resistance and reopened Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
with his Berliner Ensemble
. On the other side some streams tried to establish "Pure Workers Theater", played by workers and performing plays about workers.
After Brecht died, there was a lot of conflict between the artists and the family (around Helene Weigel
) about the Brecht heritage. Heinz Kahlau, Slatan Dudow
, Erwin Geschonneck
, Erwin Strittmatter
, Peter Hacks
, Benno Besson
, Peter Palitzsch and Ekkehard Schall
are counted among Brecht's scholars and followers.
In the 1950s the Swiss Benno Besson
had success with "The Dragon" by Jewgenij Schwarz. As a result he travelled with Deutsches Theater
around Europe and Asia (and also in Japan). He became the Intendant at Volksbühne
in the 1960s and often worked with Heiner Müller
.
Because of censorship
, many artists left the GDR from 1975 onwards. A parallel development was that some artists moved out to small city theaters, to create theater beyond Berlin
. For example Peter Sodann
founded the Neues Theater in Halle/Saale and Frank Castorf
worked at a theatre in Anklam
.
Theater and Cabaret had a very important status for the people in the GDR and it was a very active and dynamic scene. This was the cause of some contention with the state. Benno Besson was quoted as saying about the relationship between cabaret and the state: "At least they took us seriously."
Movies about persecution of Jews in the Third Reich like Jakob, der Lügner and the resistance against fascism Fünf Patronenhülsen, (both directed by Frank Beyer
), became internationally famous.
Movies about problems of daily life like Die Legende von Paul und Paula (directed by Heiner Carow
) or Solo Sunny
(directed by Konrad Wolf
and Wolfgang Kohlhaase) were also very popular.
Especially remarkable are Red Westerns, in which American Indians
often took the role of the displaced people in contrast to American Westerns, in which they are often not mentioned or play the violators. Gojko Mitić
is the most famous actor in this role; he often played the righteous, kindhearted and charming Chief (Die Söhne der Großen Bärin
directed by Josef Mach
). He became an honorary chief of the Sioux
nation, when he visited the United States of America in the 90's and the accompanying television crew showed the Sioux one of his movies.
Because of censorship a certain number of very remarkable movies were forbidden at this time. They were only shown after the Wende in 1990. Examples are Traces of Stones
(directed by Frank Beyer
) and Der geteilte Himmel
(directed by Konrad Wolf
).
GDR cinemas did not only screen domestic productions. Besides the Czech, Polish, and other Eastern European productions, certain foreign movies were shown as well, although the number was limited due to the cost of purchasing the licences. Movies which represented or glorified a capitalistic ideology were not bought. For example Grease
was not shown but One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
was. Comedies were popular, such as the Danish Olsen Gang
or movies with the French comedian Louis de Funès
.
There were two nation-wide state TV stations, DFF1 and DFF2. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, these were gradually merged into the structures of the Federal Republic's public broadcasting system, being followed up by Länder
-based regional stations like the MDR and the RBB.
As the arrangement of aerial antennae on roofs differed depending on whether TV-owners watched one of these channels or one from Western Germany, especially during the 1950s and '60s, viewers of Western TV were prone to denunciation by patriotic neighbors or FDJ
members. However by the 1980s the authorities were largely resigned to the presence of Western broadcasts and even tolerated the existence of communal antennas and cable systems carrying both DFF and Western channels.
The DEFA was one of the largest TV production companies within German language borders and produced an own school of TV- and movie-making, that frequently dared to feature covert criticism of the establishment, thus playing with the fire of censorship. As of today, the DEFA is still famous for own GDR-time productions of high-quality, non-commercialist fairy-tale movies, while maintaining large high-standard infrastructures for producing high-quality German
dub versions of movies or other productions from other countries from the Soviet Bloc. Fairy-tale movies from those countries and the GDR were also in high esteem among adults, as they were frequent vehicles for covert criticism of the political and economical elite.
(a combination of "Ost" (East) and "Nostalgie" (nostalgia)).
meant something entirely different than driving a Wartburg or even a Lada
- conclusions about personal conduct of these different types of car owners seemed natural.
Some brands have been revived since the 1990s, as there was notable dissatisfaction among the East Germans with Western consumer goods - the marketing techniques working so well with a population used to Capitalism seemed to fail with them. So "Ostprodukt" (roughly, "East German product") carries a positive-enough connotation for many East Germans, that the marketing industry focused on bringing "reliable", well-known consumer goods back on the shelves in the limits of concentrated rebranding efforts, instead of pushing through their established Western trademarks only.
suburbs were more a rule than an exception and there was a heavy reliance on the aesthetics of the atomic age, featuring a tendency against edges and corners as a semi-conscious attempt to do away with rectangular shapes from Nazism, without much devaluating its likenesses in Stalinist architecture.
One buzzword often heard in this context is Socialist Classicism, while the Western reference to the same phenomenon is Stalinist architecture
. In GDR its representative building tendencies were sometimes referred to as „stalinistischer Zuckerbäckerstil“ (roughly: "Stalinist Confectioner Style") or „Stalingotik“ (Stalinist Gothic
), unofficially.
Notable examples of GDR architecture are / were:
of literature
, the media
and the arts
, political jokes were one of the main outlets for criticism of the German Democratic Republic
(East Germany). After reunification, these became known as DDR-Witze (GDR jokes). Political jokes of this form have almost disappeared since reunification as they no longer play the same subversive role, being replaced by open democratic debate, political cartoons and satire
.
The GDR citizens had a special term for referring to some of the more critical jokes as five-year-jokes (i.e., three years prison for the one telling it and two for all who listen and laugh). There is also a morphological reference to "five-year-plan" - in a way, talking about a five-year-joke was a "meta-joke".
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
and Communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
. A reflection on the history of arts and culture in East Germany reveals complex relationships between artists and the state, between oppositional and conformist art. In a short four decades, East Germany developed a distinct culture and produced works of literature, film, visual arts, music, and theatre of international acclaim.
Socialist Realism
In the 1950s the officially encouraged form of art was known as 'Socialist RealismSocialist realism
Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...
'. This was intended to depict everyday life under Socialism in a way that showed the benefits of living and working in East Germany.
Music
Rock bands were expected to sing in German only. This seemed a logical constraint by Party leaders but it was somewhat unpopular amongst young people. Another problem for the authorities was having to check song texts very carefully for anti-state tendencies. The band Renft, for example, was prone to political misbehaviour, which eventually led to its breakdown.The Puhdys
Puhdys
The Puhdys are a veteran German rock band, formed in Oranienburg , in what was then the German Democratic Republic, in 1969, although they had been performing together, with various lineups, as the Puhdys since 1965. They continue to record and tour...
and Karat were popular mainstream bands, managing to hint at critical thoughts in their lyrics without being explicit. Like most mainstream acts, they appeared in popular youth magazines such as Neues Leben and Magazin.
Influences from the West were heard everywhere, because TV and radio that came from the Klassenfeind (enemy of the working class) could be received in many parts of the East, too (a notorious exception being Dresden
Dresden
Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....
, with its geographically disadvantageous position in the Elbe
Elbe
The Elbe is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. It rises in the Krkonoše Mountains of the northwestern Czech Republic before traversing much of Bohemia , then Germany and flowing into the North Sea at Cuxhaven, 110 km northwest of Hamburg...
valley, giving it the nickname of “Valley of the Clueless” despite some Western radio being available). The Western influence led to the formation of more "underground" groups with a decisively western-oriented sound. A few of these bands were Die Skeptiker
Die Skeptiker
Die Skeptiker is a German punk band, founded in 1986 in East Berlin.Die Skeptiker were part of the so called Die anderen Bands which played political lyrics that criticised life in the GDR.In 2000, their singer, Eugen Balanskat, founded Roter Mohn...
, as well as Feeling B
Feeling B
Feeling B was a German punk rock band.The band was founded in Berlin in 1983 and started out firmly grounded in the underground punk scene. Over time, Feeling B's popularity grew greatly and at the end of the German Democratic Republic....
.
Johann Sebastian Bach
On a more traditional level, the East German government celebrated the fact that Johann Sebastian BachJohann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
was born in East German territory, and spent a great deal of money converting his house in Eisenach into a museum
Museum
A museum is an institution that cares for a collection of artifacts and other objects of scientific, artistic, cultural, or historical importance and makes them available for public viewing through exhibits that may be permanent or temporary. Most large museums are located in major cities...
of his life, which, among other things, included more than 300 instruments
Musical instrument
A musical instrument is a device created or adapted for the purpose of making musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can serve as a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. The history of musical instruments dates back to the...
from Bach's life. In 1980 this museum was receiving more than 70,000 visitors annually.
In Leipzig
Leipzig
Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...
, an enormous archive
Archive
An archive is a collection of historical records, or the physical place they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or organization's lifetime, and are kept to show the function of an organization...
with recordings of all of Bach's music was compiled, along with many historical document
Document
The term document has multiple meanings in ordinary language and in scholarship. WordNet 3.1. lists four meanings :* document, written document, papers...
s and letters both to and from him. Werner Neumann
Werner Neumann
Werner Neumann was a German musicologist. He founded the Bach-Archiv Leipzig on 20 November 1950 and was a principal editor of the Neue Bach-Ausgabe, the second edition of the complete works of Johann Sebastian Bach.- Professional career :Neumann studied at the Conservatory of Leipzig from 1928 to...
founded the Bach-Archiv Leipzig
Bach-Archiv Leipzig
The Bach-Archiv Leipzig or Bach-Archiv is the institution for the documentation and research of life and work of Johann Sebastian Bach in Leipzig, where Bach lived from 1723 until his death. Topic of research is also the Bach family, especially their music...
in 1950.
Every other year, school children from across East Germany gathered for a Bach competition held in East Berlin
East Berlin
East Berlin was the name given to the eastern part of Berlin between 1949 and 1990. It consisted of the Soviet sector of Berlin that was established in 1945. The American, British and French sectors became West Berlin, a part strongly associated with West Germany but a free city...
. Every four years an international Bach competition for keyboard
Keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument which is played using a musical keyboard. The most common of these is the piano. Other widely used keyboard instruments include organs of various types as well as other mechanical, electromechanical and electronic instruments...
and strings
String instrument
A string instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. In the Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification, used in organology, they are called chordophones...
was held.
Theatre
East German theater was strongly dominated in its early years by Bertolt BrechtBertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
, who brought back a lot of artists from the antifascist resistance and reopened Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
Theater am Schiffbauerdamm
The Theater am Schiffbauerdamm is a theatre building at the Schiffbauerdamm riverside in the Mitte district of Berlin, Germany, opened on November 19, 1892. Since 1954 it is home to the Berliner Ensemble theatre company, founded in 1949 by Helene Weigel and Bertolt Brecht.The original name of the...
with his Berliner Ensemble
Berliner Ensemble
The Berliner Ensemble is a German theatre company established by playwright Bertolt Brecht and his wife, Helene Weigel in January 1949 in East Berlin...
. On the other side some streams tried to establish "Pure Workers Theater", played by workers and performing plays about workers.
After Brecht died, there was a lot of conflict between the artists and the family (around Helene Weigel
Helene Weigel
Helene Weigel was a distinguished German actress. She was the second wife of Bertolt Brecht, and together they had a son Stefan Brecht and daughter Barbara Brecht-Schall .The daughter of a Jewish lawyer, she became a Communist Party member from 1930 and Artistic Director of the...
) about the Brecht heritage. Heinz Kahlau, Slatan Dudow
Slatan Dudow
Slatan Theodor Dudow was a Bulgarian born film director and screenwriter who made a number of films in the Weimar Republic and East Germany....
, Erwin Geschonneck
Erwin Geschonneck
Erwin Geschonneck was a German actor. His biggest success occurred in the German Democratic Republic, where he was considered one of the most famous actors of the time.-Early life:...
, Erwin Strittmatter
Erwin Strittmatter
Erwin Strittmatter was a German writer. Strittmatter was one of the most famous writers in the GDR....
, Peter Hacks
Peter Hacks
Peter Hacks was a German playwright, author, and essayist.Hacks was born in Breslau , Lower Silesia. Displaced by World War II, Hacks settled in Munich in 1947, where he made acquaintance with Thomas Mann and Bertolt Brecht...
, Benno Besson
Benno Besson
Benno Besson was a Swiss actor and director. He had great success as director at Volksbühne Berlin, Deutsches Theater and Berliner Ensemble in East-Berlin, where he went by an invitation of Bertolt Brecht in 1949...
, Peter Palitzsch and Ekkehard Schall
Ekkehard Schall
Ekkehard Schall was a German stage and screen actor/director.He was one of the best profiled actors of Brecht's works and together with Helene Weigel a member of the Berliner Ensemble....
are counted among Brecht's scholars and followers.
In the 1950s the Swiss Benno Besson
Benno Besson
Benno Besson was a Swiss actor and director. He had great success as director at Volksbühne Berlin, Deutsches Theater and Berliner Ensemble in East-Berlin, where he went by an invitation of Bertolt Brecht in 1949...
had success with "The Dragon" by Jewgenij Schwarz. As a result he travelled with Deutsches Theater
Deutsches Theater
The Deutsches Theater in Berlin is a well-known German theatre. It was built in 1850 as Friedrich-Wilhelm-Städtisches Theater, after Frederick William IV of Prussia. Located on Schumann Street , the Deutsches Theater consists of two adjoining stages that share a common, classical facade...
around Europe and Asia (and also in Japan). He became the Intendant at Volksbühne
Volksbühne
The Volksbühne is a theater in Berlin, Germany. Located in Berlin's city center Mitte on Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz in what was the GDR's capital....
in the 1960s and often worked with Heiner Müller
Heiner Müller
Heiner Müller was a German dramatist, poet, writer, essayist and theatre director. Described as "the theatre's greatest living poet" since Samuel Beckett, Müller is arguably the most important German dramatist of the 20th century after Bertolt Brecht...
.
Because of censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
, many artists left the GDR from 1975 onwards. A parallel development was that some artists moved out to small city theaters, to create theater beyond Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
. For example Peter Sodann
Peter Sodann
Peter Sodann is a German actor, director and politician. He was the Left Party's nominee for the 2009 presidential election, but was not considered a serious candidate by the German media.-Early life:...
founded the Neues Theater in Halle/Saale and Frank Castorf
Frank Castorf
Frank Castorf is a German theater director and since 1992 the artistic director of the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz...
worked at a theatre in Anklam
Anklam
Anklam is a town in the Western Pomerania region of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It is situated on the banks of the Peene river, just 8 km from its mouth in the Kleines Haff, the western part of the Stettin Lagoon. Anklam has a population of 14,603 and was the capital of the former...
.
Theater and Cabaret had a very important status for the people in the GDR and it was a very active and dynamic scene. This was the cause of some contention with the state. Benno Besson was quoted as saying about the relationship between cabaret and the state: "At least they took us seriously."
Cinema
In the GDR the movie industry was very active. Besides folksy movies, the East German movie industry became known worldwide for its productions, especially for its children's movies (Das kalte Herz and cinematic versions of the Grimms' fairy tales, and also modern productions like Das Schulgespenst).Movies about persecution of Jews in the Third Reich like Jakob, der Lügner and the resistance against fascism Fünf Patronenhülsen, (both directed by Frank Beyer
Frank Beyer
Frank Beyer was German film director. In East Germany he was one of the most important film directors, working for the state film monopoly DEFA and directed films that dealt mostly with the Nazi era and contemporary East Germany. His film Traces of Stones was banned for 20 years in 1966 by the...
), became internationally famous.
Movies about problems of daily life like Die Legende von Paul und Paula (directed by Heiner Carow
Heiner Carow
Heiner Carow was a German film director and screenwriter. His 1986 film So Many Dreams was entered into the 37th Berlin International Film Festival. The following year, he was a member of the jury at the 38th Berlin International Film Festival...
) or Solo Sunny
Solo Sunny
Solo Sunny is a 1980 East German drama film directed by Konrad Wolf and Wolfgang Kohlhaase. It was entered into the 30th Berlin International Film Festival, where Renate Krößner won the Silver Bear for Best Actress.-Cast:* Renate Krößner - Sunny...
(directed by Konrad Wolf
Konrad Wolf
Konrad Wolf was an East German film director, son of Friedrich Wolf, brother of Markus Wolf....
and Wolfgang Kohlhaase) were also very popular.
Especially remarkable are Red Westerns, in which American Indians
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
often took the role of the displaced people in contrast to American Westerns, in which they are often not mentioned or play the violators. Gojko Mitić
Gojko Mitic
Gojko Mitić is a Serbian director, actor, stuntman, and author. He lives in Berlin....
is the most famous actor in this role; he often played the righteous, kindhearted and charming Chief (Die Söhne der Großen Bärin
The Sons of Great Bear
The Sons of Great Bear is a German language Red Western of 1966, directed by Josef Mach. The main characters are based on the books of Liselotte Welskopf-Henrich with the same name, which have been very successful, especially in East Germany...
directed by Josef Mach
Josef Mach
Josef Mach was a Czech actor, screenwriter and film director.Josef Mach worked as a journalist and stage performer at the beginning of his career, then in 1938 was appointed assistant director of short films at Grafo Film Studio working with director Václav Kubásek...
). He became an honorary chief of the Sioux
Sioux
The Sioux are Native American and First Nations people in North America. The term can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or any of the nation's many language dialects...
nation, when he visited the United States of America in the 90's and the accompanying television crew showed the Sioux one of his movies.
Because of censorship a certain number of very remarkable movies were forbidden at this time. They were only shown after the Wende in 1990. Examples are Traces of Stones
Traces of Stones
Traces of Stones is a 1966 East German film by Frank Beyer. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Erik Neutsch and starred Manfred Krug in the main role. After its premiere in Potsdam the film was shown only for three days, then the film was shelved due to conflicts with the Socialist...
(directed by Frank Beyer
Frank Beyer
Frank Beyer was German film director. In East Germany he was one of the most important film directors, working for the state film monopoly DEFA and directed films that dealt mostly with the Nazi era and contemporary East Germany. His film Traces of Stones was banned for 20 years in 1966 by the...
) and Der geteilte Himmel
Der geteilte Himmel
Divided Heaven is an East German drama film directed by Konrad Wolf. It was released in 1964.-Plot:While recovering from a mental breakdown, the young Rita Seidel recalls the last two years: in which she fell in love with Manfred, a chemist who is ten years older. As Manfred became disillusioned...
(directed by Konrad Wolf
Konrad Wolf
Konrad Wolf was an East German film director, son of Friedrich Wolf, brother of Markus Wolf....
).
GDR cinemas did not only screen domestic productions. Besides the Czech, Polish, and other Eastern European productions, certain foreign movies were shown as well, although the number was limited due to the cost of purchasing the licences. Movies which represented or glorified a capitalistic ideology were not bought. For example Grease
Grease (film)
Grease is a 1978 American musical film directed by Randal Kleiser and based on Warren Casey's and Jim Jacobs's 1971 musical of the same name about two lovers in a 1950s high school. The film stars John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John, Stockard Channing, and Jeff Conaway...
was not shown but One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (film)
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a 1975 American drama film directed by Miloš Forman and based on the 1962 novel of the same name by Ken Kesey....
was. Comedies were popular, such as the Danish Olsen Gang
Olsen Gang
The Olsen Gang is a fictional Danish criminal gang in the movies of the same name. The gang's leader is the criminal genius and habitual offender Egon Olsen. The other members of the gang are Benny and Kjeld . The gang members are harmless and never use violence...
or movies with the French comedian Louis de Funès
Louis de Funès
Louis Germain David de Funès de Galarza was a very popular French actor who is one of the giants of French comedy alongside André Bourvil and Fernandel...
.
Television
States of Germany
Germany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...
-based regional stations like the MDR and the RBB.
As the arrangement of aerial antennae on roofs differed depending on whether TV-owners watched one of these channels or one from Western Germany, especially during the 1950s and '60s, viewers of Western TV were prone to denunciation by patriotic neighbors or FDJ
Free German Youth
The Free German Youth, also known as the FDJ , was the official socialist youth movement of the German Democratic Republic and the Socialist Unity Party of Germany....
members. However by the 1980s the authorities were largely resigned to the presence of Western broadcasts and even tolerated the existence of communal antennas and cable systems carrying both DFF and Western channels.
The DEFA was one of the largest TV production companies within German language borders and produced an own school of TV- and movie-making, that frequently dared to feature covert criticism of the establishment, thus playing with the fire of censorship. As of today, the DEFA is still famous for own GDR-time productions of high-quality, non-commercialist fairy-tale movies, while maintaining large high-standard infrastructures for producing high-quality German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
dub versions of movies or other productions from other countries from the Soviet Bloc. Fairy-tale movies from those countries and the GDR were also in high esteem among adults, as they were frequent vehicles for covert criticism of the political and economical elite.
Material Culture
It is especially but not only the material culture of the GDR that receives renewed attention under marketing-focused considerations of what is called OstalgieOstalgie
Ostalgie is a German term referring to nostalgia for aspects of life in East Germany. It is derived from the German words Ost and Nostalgie ....
(a combination of "Ost" (East) and "Nostalgie" (nostalgia)).
Consumerism
The GDR's economy produced a whole series of consumer goods and associated consumerist practices different from both West German and Soviet bloc cultures. Thus, a consumerist culture developed with (in contrast to the West relatively clear-cut) prestige allocations according to consumerist practices. For example, driving a TrabantTrabant
The Trabant is a car that was produced by former East German auto maker VEB Sachsenring Automobilwerke Zwickau in Zwickau, Sachsen. It was the most common vehicle in East Germany, and was also exported to countries both inside and outside the communist bloc...
meant something entirely different than driving a Wartburg or even a Lada
Lada
Lada is a trademark of AvtoVAZ, a Russian car manufacturer in Tolyatti, Samara Oblast. All AvtoVAZ vehicles are currently sold under the Lada brand, though this was not always so; Lada was originally AvtoVAZ's export brand for models it sold under the Zhiguli name in the domestic Soviet market...
- conclusions about personal conduct of these different types of car owners seemed natural.
Some brands have been revived since the 1990s, as there was notable dissatisfaction among the East Germans with Western consumer goods - the marketing techniques working so well with a population used to Capitalism seemed to fail with them. So "Ostprodukt" (roughly, "East German product") carries a positive-enough connotation for many East Germans, that the marketing industry focused on bringing "reliable", well-known consumer goods back on the shelves in the limits of concentrated rebranding efforts, instead of pushing through their established Western trademarks only.
Architecture
Sharing some elements with Stalinist grandiosity, GDR architecture blends into the regionally different styles of post-war city-building of the world: PanelákPanelák
is a colloquial term in Czech and Slovak for a panel building constructed of pre-fabricated, pre-stressed concrete, such as those extant in Czech Republic and elsewhere in the former Soviet bloc...
suburbs were more a rule than an exception and there was a heavy reliance on the aesthetics of the atomic age, featuring a tendency against edges and corners as a semi-conscious attempt to do away with rectangular shapes from Nazism, without much devaluating its likenesses in Stalinist architecture.
One buzzword often heard in this context is Socialist Classicism, while the Western reference to the same phenomenon is Stalinist architecture
Stalinist architecture
Stalinist architecture , also referred to as Stalinist Gothic, or Socialist Classicism, is a term given to architecture of the Soviet Union between 1933, when Boris Iofan's draft for Palace of the Soviets was officially approved, and 1955, when Nikita Khrushchev condemned "excesses" of the past...
. In GDR its representative building tendencies were sometimes referred to as „stalinistischer Zuckerbäckerstil“ (roughly: "Stalinist Confectioner Style") or „Stalingotik“ (Stalinist Gothic
Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished during the high and late medieval period. It evolved from Romanesque architecture and was succeeded by Renaissance architecture....
), unofficially.
Notable examples of GDR architecture are / were:
- the Palace of the Republic
- the AlexanderplatzAlexanderplatzAlexanderplatz is a large public square and transport hub in the central Mitte district of Berlin, near the Fernsehturm. Berliners often call it simply Alex, referring to a larger neighborhood stretching from Mollstraße in the northeast to Spandauer Straße and the City Hall in the southwest.-Early...
, where much of the GDR buildings still shape the place - the city-centre buildings of Leipzig's Karl-Marx-UniversityUniversity of LeipzigThe University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
(now partly disassembled and partly being replaced by a post-modern building), including the City-Hochhaus LeipzigCity-Hochhaus LeipzigCity-Hochhaus , at a height of 142.5 metres, is the tallest building in the city of Leipzig, and the tallest multistory building erected in the former East Germany. It was designed by architect Hermann Henselmann in the shape of an open book, and built between 1968 and 1972...
GDR jokes
With widespread censorshipCensorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
of literature
Literature
Literature is the art of written works, and is not bound to published sources...
, the media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
and the arts
ARts
aRts, which stands for analog Real time synthesizer, is an audio framework that is no longer under development. It is best known for previously being used in KDE to simulate an analog synthesizer....
, political jokes were one of the main outlets for criticism of the German Democratic Republic
German Democratic Republic
The German Democratic Republic , informally called East Germany by West Germany and other countries, was a socialist state established in 1949 in the Soviet zone of occupied Germany, including East Berlin of the Allied-occupied capital city...
(East Germany). After reunification, these became known as DDR-Witze (GDR jokes). Political jokes of this form have almost disappeared since reunification as they no longer play the same subversive role, being replaced by open democratic debate, political cartoons and satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
.
The GDR citizens had a special term for referring to some of the more critical jokes as five-year-jokes (i.e., three years prison for the one telling it and two for all who listen and laugh). There is also a morphological reference to "five-year-plan" - in a way, talking about a five-year-joke was a "meta-joke".
See also
- GDR LiteratureGDR LiteratureGDR literature is the literature produced in East Germany from the time of the Soviet occupation in 1945 until the end of the communist government in 1990. Because the time span actually precedes the establishment of the German Democratic Republic, another term used is "East German" literature...
- Deutscher FernsehfunkDeutscher FernsehfunkDeutscher Fernsehfunk , known from 1972 to 1990 as Fernsehen der DDR , was the state television broadcaster in East Germany.-Foundation:...
, state television broadcaster - Rundfunk der DDR, state radio broadcaster
- DEFA