Four-Color Communism

Comic Books and Contested Power in the German Democratic Republic

Sean Eedy (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

230 Seiten

2024
Berghahn Books (Verlag)
978-1-80539-336-8 (ISBN)

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As with all other forms of popular culture, comics in East Germany were tightly controlled by the state. Comics were employed as extensions of the regime’s educational system, delivering official ideology so as to develop the “socialist personality” of young people and generate enthusiasm for state socialism. The East German children who avidly read these comics, however, found their own meanings in and projected their own desires upon them. Four-Color Communism gives a lively account of East German comics from both perspectives, showing how the perceived freedoms they embodied created expectations that ultimately limited the regime’s efforts to bring readers into the fold.

Sean Eedy holds a doctorate in history from Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada. His publications include articles and chapters on comic book representations of the Holocaust, animated DEFA adaptations of Brothers Grimm’s Fairy Tales, and time travel and historical representation in the work of Hannes Hegen. Sean is currently an independent researcher and part-time professor in the Department of History at Trent University.

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgements

List of Abbreviations and Terms

Introduction: Comics at the Intersection of State Power and Childhood

Chapter 1. Comics and the Crisis of Kultur in the SED State

Chapter 2. State Power and the East German Zeitgeist

Chapter 3. Power, Eigensinn, and the Construction of Space through Comics

Chapter 4. Escape, Escapism, and the Cultural Imperialism of Comic Book Travel in Mosaik and Atze

Chapter 5. Western Influence, Popular Taste, and the Limitations of the FDJ’s Publishing Regime

Conclusion

Bibliography

Index

Erscheinungsdatum	13.06.2024
Verlagsort	Oxford
Sprache	englisch
Themenwelt	Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte
	Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte ► Kulturgeschichte
	Sozialwissenschaften
ISBN-10	1-80539-336-7 / 1805393367
ISBN-13	978-1-80539-336-8 / 9781805393368
Zustand	Neuware