The Discourse of Location

Abstract

This article examines the recent rise in popularity of German film, in particular comedy, with German cinema audiences. This trend contrasts sharply with negative reviews from cinema critics while being in line with the agenda of popular directors and certain conservative politicians. The article examines what may be deduced about the place of such a cinema in the rearticulation of a specifically German national-popular culture and how this may inform us about the importance of the location of post-unification Germany in the global context in terms of its national identity. By national-popular is meant the ways in which popular entertainment can be used to create a network of identifications within a specific linguistic and cultural grouping such as the nation-state. It also has a resonance of Antonio Gramsci's usage in his Prison Notebooks in that it helps to understand the informal way in which popular culture may actively support the nationalist rhetoric which is necessary to legitimate a nationstate. This is particularly relevant in contemporary Germany, which needs as a political entity to ensure broad support for its reconfigured status.