Sedan Day

Abstract

Abstract This chapter examines local Sedan Day celebrations through the prism of competing rhythms of life. On 2 September 1870, French troops were defeated in a decisive battle by German troops. For the champions of the new nation-state, 2 September was predestined to become Germany's national holiday. Yet Sedan Day would remain controversial. For its critics 2 September was not merely a new date in the nation's calendar. Rather, they saw it as connected to a series of seemingly mundane schedules that defined the liberal-nationalist vision of progress It was this sense of the festival's hegemonic aspirations that prompted a number of creative interventions and disruptions. In this way, the totalising conception of nationalist time gave way to a more pluralist pattern