Title: Deconstruction of National Identity in the Third Reich:<i>Nazisprache und Geopolitik</i>
Abstract: Abstract Under the Third Reich, concepts of Geopolitik and Lebensraum were redefined. The Nazi Party developed Nazisprache, a coded, convoluted vocabulary used to describe, delimit and eventually destroy undesirable populations (primarily Jews, Gypsies, mentally ill, disabled, etc.). By corrupting conventional German meaning, Nazi officials legally extended borders of Nazi-controlled territories while successfully suppressing knowledge of their cruelty. As Nazi communications grew more circumspect, ‘euphemism’ increased; national and personal boundaries were linguistically renamed and politically re-conceptualised, potentiating the thorough dissolution of nation, person and ethnic entity. ‘A yielding to the form prepares for assent to the matter identified with it.’ (Kenneth Burke) Keywords: HolocaustJew(s)Nazi PolicyForced Emigration, Murder Notes 1. American Judaephobia hit a high: ‘ … General resentment against the Jews increased during most of the war and reached a climax in 1944. Opinion polls in 1945, after the mass killings in Europe were common knowledge, showed that 75 percent of the respondents had not changed their attitudes toward American Jews.’ (J. E. Doneson, Citation1987, p. 49). 2. Obviously little of this description applies to the large assimilated population. 3. Personal letter from Marion Nobel, Dec. 2004. I thank Mrs Nobel for expert assistance and knowledge in this article's revision. 4. Despite horrendous expansion and settlement practices in, for example, North America and Australia, there was no formulation of genocidal policy, explicit or implicit. 5. Nobel points out that this programme enabled ‘ordinary Germans to participate in travel to distant places they could never have afforded on their own.’ (Personal letter from Marion Nobel, Dec. 2004.) Paradoxically inclusive—offering Germans experiences with other cultures—travel is congruous with Lebensraum's over-arching paradigm, as distant places would meet eventual incorporation into the Reich. 6. Holocaust scholars (Terence des Pres, Lawrence Langer, Saul Friedman, George Steiner et al.,) attempting to explain the catastrophe agree that the Nazis created horrors for which no words existed. 7. Klemperer insists that Herzl, not coincidentally German, influenced Hitler with his formulation of Zionism (2000). 8. Marion Nobel, Dec. 2004. 9. Document L-003 of the Nürnberg International Military Tribunal. 10. Nobel points out that Kampf is properly translated ‘battle or combat,’ and ‘the aim of the Kampfbund is more than to “inform”…it is to inform aggressively’ (Dec. 2004, my italics). In Munich Alfred Rosenberg, an ardent proponent of eugenics, sterilisation and mutilation, headed this organization. Among the 18 other founding members were academics, publishers, theatre directors, writers and clergymen. 11. A chapter in Mein Kampf explicates Hitler's views on art. Having eliminated the intelligentsia likely to read, Hitler capitalized on written work by having it read aloud by well-established Aryan actors at diverse cultural meetings. Famous actor Lothar Müthel was among many who delivered the work with ‘necessary poignancy’ (Rao, p.18). Hitler considered himself a contributor to art—apparent from his 1938 confession to English ambassador Henderson that he was ‘an artist by nature’ and wanted to ‘end life as an artist not as a war maker’ (Rao, p.18, ff.35). 12. Phrases vilifying Jews made early appearances in Mein Kampf, and were liberally repeated in Julius Streicher's racist tabloid die Volkischer Beobacter 13. My emphasis added.
Publication Year: 2006
Publication Date: 2006-06-01
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 3
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