German Language Newspapers Research Articles

Bitva za Stalingrad na stranicah gazety «Novoe vremya»

In Yugoslavia, after the collapse of the kingdom, periodicals were no longer available. The daily informative propaganda newspaper “Novo Vreme”, which was published from May 16,1941 to October 5,1944, when all German and Serbian language newspapers were banned by the decree of the German authorities, embraced the establishment of the occupation administration in Serbia. From August 4, an additional issue called “Novo vreme Ponedeljak” was published.

The History of DeWitt County (1899) by C. H. Waltersdorf, Publisher and Editor of the Lavaca County News

The History of DeWitt County (1899) by C. H. Waltersdorf, Publisher and Editor of the Lavaca County News Translated by James C. Kearney (bio) Click for larger view View full resolution C. H. Waltersdorf's Geschichte von DeWitt County (1899). Courtesy of DeWitt County Historical Museum. [End Page 518] As the 175th anniversary of DeWitt County approached in 2020, members of the DeWitt County Historical Commission began preparing for a grand celebration commensurate with the county's rich history. One of the commission members, Beverly Bruns of Yorktown, discovered C. H. Waltersdorf's history among her family papers. It is the only known extant copy of his published study, which he wrote in German and published in 1899. Beyond the fact that Waltersdorf had briefly published a German language newspaper in neighboring Lavaca County, the Lavaca County Nachrichten, almost nothing was known about him. Both he and his history, it would seem, had slipped into oblivion. However, Peggy Ledbetter, president of the commission, quickly recognized the value of the forgotten narrative and agreed that a translation would be a valuable addition to the planned celebration. Mary Brindley, another commission member, approached me about doing the translation. After a quick perusal of the scans, which were all legible, I agreed to undertake the project. In addition to the translation itself, I was able to put together a short biography of Waltersdorf and to provide extensive endnotes to his narrative. Carl Herman Waltersdorf was born in Germany in 1872 and died in Cuero, Texas, in 1937.1 He lived an extraordinary, restless life marked by [End Page 519] many abrupt twists and turns. In 1889, at the age of seventeen, he came to the United States with a brother to join his parents, who had emigrated to Texas twelve years previously. Upon arriving in Texas, his father had purchased a small farm near Runge, just across the DeWitt County line in neighboring Karnes County, where he set up a homestead in an area with a strong and growing German presence. The town of Runge, in fact, had coalesced around a mercantile store and post office established by business associates of Henry Runge (1816–73), a successful and farsighted Texas German businessman.2 When Waltersdorf arrived in Texas, not only was he reunited with his parents, whom he had not seen in twelve years, but he also met for the first time his new brothers and sisters, who had been born in Texas. One can only imagine the story behind this unusual arrangement. Once settled, the teenager soon found employment as a typesetter with the Deutsche Rundschau, a German language newspaper published in Cuero, where he learned the newspaper trade at an early age. At the age of twenty, he married the daughter of a German American family in Cuero by the name of Ziehahn; they were a family of some means, apparently, because they helped him establish his own German language newspaper, the Lavaca County Nachrichten, in neighboring Hallettsville in 1895.3 An episode from the period suggests that he might have offended some readers on occasion: Editor Waltersdorf of the Nachrichten and Dr. Schiersman of Shiner had a little difficulty here at the post office last Saturday during which the editor knocked the doctor down. We have not been able to get fully into the merits of the affair, but what we have learned would go to show that Mr. Waltersdorf had considerable provocation for what he did. Mr. Waltersdorf went immediately before Mayor Eschenburg and paid his fine. Scrapping is rather an expensive luxury for newspaper men to be indulging in.4 In 1899, Waltersdorf penned his History of DeWitt County, which he advertised in his newspaper and sold as a supplement for twenty-five cents. According to the Hallettsville Herald, he also traveled around the county to give talks and promote his history.5 For reasons that are unclear, Waltersdorf apparently became disenchanted with the newspaper business after a scant five years. In May 1900, he sold the paper to his younger brother, Richard (Dick) Waltersdorf, who had worked for him as a typesetter and under whose stewardship the paper continued for many...

PECULIARITIES OFADJECTIVAL VOCABULARY IN MODERN GERMAN ADVERTISEMENTS

У запропонованій статті висвітлено один з аспектів дослідження особливостей функціонування прикметникової лексики в рекламних текстах в сучасних німецькомовних газетах та журналах. Увага зосереджена на ад’єктивах, що формують ЛСГ на позначення якості предмета, внутрішніх властивостей, зовнішніх ознак тощо, які трапляються в рекламних текстах. Застосована комплексна методика опрацювання інформації, що включає в себе аналіз, синтез, порівняння, узагальнення, описовий та статистичний (критерій хі-квадрат, коефіцієнт взаємної спряженості) методи. Матеріалом дослідження слугували 205 рекламних текстів з газет “Die Zeit” (2016, 2021 рр.), “Der Spiegel” (2021 р.), “Burda Style” (2021 р.), брошур про навчання та заклади освіти, онлайн ресурсів тощо, в яких визначено 1773 прикметникові лексеми. У процесі дослідження здійснено класифікації ЛСГ прикметників та сфер реклами. За результатами частотної характеристики визначені високочастотні, середньочастотні та низькочастотні ЛСГ прикметників. В результаті лексичного аналізу рекламного матеріалу виявлено суттєві синтагматичні зв’язки в моделі “досліджувані ЛСГ прикметників + досліджувана сфера реклами”, а також міра зв’заності словосполучень. При дослідженні рекламного слогану з’ясовано, що наявність суттєвих синтагматичних зв’язків ЛСГ прикметників не залежить від частотності їх вживання з виділеними сферами реклами; словосполучення, суттєві синтагматичні зв’язки яких характеризуються високим ступенем зв’язності (К ≥ 0,3), належать до елементів сталого контексту; найсуттєвіші зв’язки досліджувані ЛСГ прикметників демонструють з такими сферами реклами: сфера моди, сфера продажу товарів, сфера продажу алкогольних товарів, сфера краси, реклама аксесуарів, реклама журналів та газет, сфера медіа-простору, сфера здобуття освіти, сфера туризму, літературна сфера, сфера працевлаштування, медична сфера.

Sketches of Spain: The Role of the Left-Wing Press in Britain, the Netherlands, and amongst Exiled Germans in Recruiting Volunteers for Republican Spain during the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939

This article investigates how, during the Spanish Civil War (1936–9), left-wing British, Dutch and German-language newspapers ‘recruited’ their readers to the cause of the Spanish Republic. Recruitment could consist of donating time, money, social and political capital, or, in extreme cases, actually joining the fighting in Spain. It employs a double comparative approach, analysing recruitment messages attuned to readers in three different national political contexts and cultures produced on behalf of socialist and communist organisations. It argues that different ‘sketches of Spain’ co-existed, aligned to different domestic political and popular cultures and through different ideological lenses. These different sketches, in turn, were vital in shaping people's expectations of the Civil War, circumscribed the scope for and content of anti-fascist transnational connections made in Spain, and helped foster new understandings of social and political circumstances at home.

Die Natur und deren Elemente in ausgewählten frühen deutschgeschriebenen Erzählungen Karel Klostermanns. Umriss einer literarischen Landschaft

The aim of this article is to explore the depiction of nature and its elements in Klostermannʼs early German short stories. These stories were mostly published during the 1880s in the Prague-based German-language newspaper Politik. Eleven of the stories, published by Gerold Dvorak at the Stutz Publishing House in Passau under the title Faustins Geschichten aus dem Böhmerwald (2003), were selected for the research. A further aim of the study is to explore how the literary landscape was constituted in these short stories. The research is based on the principles of hermeneutic analysis.

Turnerschaft Von Rio Grande Do Sul: Gymnastics and Germanness in Brazil (1895–1938)

This article aims to understand how the notion of Germanness was expressed in the German-Brazilian gymnastics societies organised under Turnerschaft von Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. It examines the period between 1895 when Turnerschaft von Rio Grande do Sul was established in Brazil and 1938 when the Brazilian government initiated a nationalisation policy of institutions founded by immigrants. Its sources are statutes, clippings of German-language newspapers circulating in Brazil, commemorative magazines published by gymnastics societies, as well as magazines edited by the clubs studied. The study concludes that this social group, defined by the German-Brazilian gymnasts and their respective communities of immigrants, resisted certain representations coming from different origins, from both the Brazilian and German states.

Meaningful Encounters? Egon Erwin Kisch’s ‘Prague Forays’ and Our Post-COVID World

ABSTRACT In 1910, Egon Erwin Kisch published the first instalment of his ‘Prague Forays’ column for Bohemia, the city’s pre-eminent German-language newspaper. The column, which ran for more than a year, launched the young writer’s literary career. This essay argues that Kisch’s ‘Prague Forays’ feuilletons, which walked his middle-class readers to down-and-out places throughout the city, can inspire us to think differently about urban encounters then and now. It probes the meanings that Kisch, a German-speaking Jew who inhabited an increasingly ‘Czech’ city, derived from his forays. It also confronts his feuilletons’ more problematic aspects, asking to what extent Kisch’s encounters with difference were ‘meaningful’, defined by humanist geographer Gill Valentine as contact that changes values and engenders a greater respect for others. How can we know if an encounter has been ‘meaningful’, and can such encounters be ‘meaningful’ for everyone involved?

Snakes, Sharks, and the Great Barrier Reef: Selected Use of Anglicisms to Represent Australia in the Australian German-Language Newspaper, Die Woche

Much research into language contact, specifically on anglicisms in German, investigates the appearance and use of English borrowings in the print media published in Germany, Austria, or Switzerland. While these publications are intended for a German-speaking audience in majority German-speaking countries, it remains to be explored what happens to English loans when they appear in a German-language publication produced in a majority English-speaking country. This raises questions about how the local environment, issues and events related to the country of publication are represented lexically to a local audience who are familiar with these concepts in English. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, I analyze a selection of anglicisms related to Australia in a corpus of 25,147 types and 223,671 tokens from the Australian-published German-language newspaper Die Woche. The findings indicate that most of these anglicism types occur within the semantic fields of place and society. The frequency and distribution of various types, such as adapted and unadapted borrowings, loan translations and loan renditions, including flagged lexical units and codeswitching, appears to be determined mostly by authorship and intended audience of individual articles rather than the newspaper as a whole. Articles attributed to the dpa (Deutsche Presse-Agentur “German Press Agency”) contain a higher incidence of loan translations, loan renditions, and flagging devices, particularly of proper nouns, than those attributed to local journalists. While this may allow international readers of the articles distributed via the dpa to better understand Australian events, institutions, social phenomena, and place, it may have a distancing or even alienating effect for local German speakers, situating them outside mainstream Australian society.

Iconography of Child Sexual Abuse in the News (Justice and Crime Reporting)

Iconography of Child Sexual Abuse in the News (Justice and Crime Reporting)

Голод в Поволжье 1920-х годов глазами немецких колонистов

Based on the analysis of the letters from German colonists to the German-language newspaper Die Welt-Post, published in Lincoln in the United States, the article brings to light the colonists’ perception of socio-economic and political events in the Volga colonies in the early 1920s. The study of letters made it possible to show the scale of the tragedy and the attitude of Germans to what was happening. The author identifies several problems that worried them: deficit of foodstuff or clothing which was compensated for by selling or exchanging their belongings. In addition, they experienced a certain information vacuum which they wanted to fill through books, magazines and newspapers received from relatives and friends.

The Cultivation of Emotions in the Press

In early nineteenth-century German-speaking Europe, the press was a key cultural forum, in which emotions were discussed in public through newly emerging journalistic practices and discourses. The era of educational reforms created debates about the right kinds of means of cultivating the human. One of the key concepts of these debates was the concept of ‘education of the heart’ (Bildung des Herzens). The searchable collections of German-language newspapers and periodicals, such as the ANNO and digiPress repositories provided by the Austrian National Library and Bavarian State Library, open up new vistas of exploring the material across regional borders and established categories and genres, which provides new insight into the ways in which the press shaped ideas of and discourses surrounding the education of emotions in German-speaking Europe.

Digitized German-language Newspapers

Digitized German-language Newspapers

The Digitalization of Minority Language Newspapers

The aim of the present article is to analyse how selected minority language newspapers have been adopting to the challenges, as well as the opportunities linked to digitalization. This is approached in a long-term perspective, and thus also takes into account the most recent changes implemented as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic. The analysed outlets are Berria (a Basque language newspaper published in Spain), Der Nordschleswiger (a German language newspaper published in Denmark), Flensborg Avis (a Danish language newspaper published in Germany) and Nós Diario (a Galician language newspaper published in Spain). Each is characterized by a strong and multifaceted digital presence, in combination with the availability of a print edition albeit in varying frequency. The analysis is anchored in a broad theoretical reflection concerning the nexus between digitalization and minority language media, whereas methodologically it draws from three main sources: interviews with staff members of each newspaper, articles published by the newspapers in terms of self-reporting on the digitalization-related aspects, and available annual reports. With regard to the findings, the analysis paints a picture of the complex, long-term and continuous adaptation strategies of the considered newspapers to the digital context, with the pandemic period resulting in consolidation rather than in major modifications. Only in the case of Flensborg Avis can the issue of a relative deepening of the digital shift be mentioned, although this is also against the backdrop of previously initiated digitalization-related changes. Consequently, this comparative study offers a unique consideration of both kin and non- kin state situations, showing that certain trends can be observed in contrasting linguistic and institutional settings; however without identifying a clear best practice model.

„Bis zur Grenze des Tragbaren“. Zur Geschichte der Kritik am Antisemitismus im Feuilleton des ›Pester Lloyd‹ 1933 bis 1944.

“At the limit of tolerability”: On the history of criticism of anti-Semitism in the feuilleton of ›Pester Lloyd‹ 1933–1944. When Siegfried Brachfeld’s dissertation on the last decade of the most influential Germanlanguage newspaper in Hungary appeared in 1971, a turning point in the cultural and scientific debate about anti-Semitism became apparent. A contemporary contextualisation of the only academic work by the popular entertainer constitutes the starting point for an inspection of the reception of literary antisemitism in Hungarian fiction with the help of random samples from ›Pester Lloyd‹.

Potential Pathways to the German Bioeconomy: A Media Discourse Analysis of Public Perceptions

The bioeconomy has emerged as a popular, but ambiguous vision for a sustainable future. Its implementation depends not only on novel products and production processes, but also on balancing diverse interests, values, and interpretations of the concept. The German government’s plan to develop a sustainable bioeconomy in response to structural change in the lignite mining regions provides a unique opportunity to investigate what pathways towards the bioeconomy are supported by society. In order to characterize bioeconomy visions prevalent in public perception, we conducted a computer-assisted, mixed-methods discourse analysis of German-language newspaper articles published between 2010 and 2019. Results show that a techno-economic vision is dominant over ecological and social aspects, suggesting only one clear pathway to the German bioeconomy, which is increasingly criticized in the public debate.

Contagious Humanism in Early Nineteenth-Century German-Language Press

This article explores the ways the emerging concept of humanism was circulated and defined in early nineteenth-century German-language press. By analyzing a digitized corpus of German-language newspapers and periodicals published between 1808 and 1850, this article looks into the ways the concept of humanism was employed in book reviews, news, political reports, and feuilleton texts. Newspapers and periodicals had a significant role in transmitting the concept of humanism from educational debates into general political language in the 1840s. Furthermore, in an era of growing social problems and political unrest, humanism became increasingly associated with moral sentiments. Accordingly, this article suggests that its new political meanings and emotional underpinnings made humanism culturally contagious, particularly immediately before and during the 1848/49 revolutions.

“It would be for the best to suspend publication”: The German–American Press and Anti-German Hysteria During World War I

During World War I, the German-American press became a lightning rod for anti-German sentiment. New rules required German-language papers to supply English translations, and many publications faced bankruptcy. Some of the most strident attacks came from English-language journalists. Analysis of content of German-language newspapers reveals how editors of those newspapers positioned their publications during World War I, responded to attacks from other journalists, and how they articulated their professional stance in relation to loyalty to the government. Questions about journalists’ obligations to expressions of patriotism and support of their government have arisen on a regular basis up to the present, and this research helps shed light on how notions of journalistic independence are reconciled with a sense of patriotic obligation.

Preserving German Texan Identity: Reminiscences of William A. Trenckmann, 1859–1935 ed. by Walter L. Buenger and Walter D. Kamphoefner

Reviewed by: Preserving German Texan Identity: Reminiscences of William A. Trenckmann, 1859–1935 ed. by Walter L. Buenger and Walter D. Kamphoefner Robert Briwa Preserving German Texan Identity: Reminiscences of William A. Trenckmann, 1859–1935. Edited by Walter L. Buenger and Walter D. Kamphoefner. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2018. vii + 248 pp. Illustrations, tables, appendixes, bibliography, index. $42.00, cloth. Memoirs are often terrific sources for scholars examining historical events and patterns, especially when presented by skilled editors. In Preserving German Texan Identity: Reminiscences of William A. Trenckmann, 1859–1935 (hereafter Preserving German Texan Identity), historians Walter Buenger and Walter Kamphoefner display how editors can make memoirs more accessible. Focused on the Gulf Coastal Plains of southeastern Texas, Trenckmann's memoir documents German Texan experiences of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Preserving German Texan Identity opens with a preface and introduction that explains the process of editing the memoir and offers an overview of Trenckmann's life. The editors draw on their previous scholarship to set Trenckmann into the contexts of Texas politics and economic histories, patterns of German immigration and ethnic identity in Texas, and twentieth-century race relations between African Americans and German Texans. Similarly, the editors' annotations of the published memoir connect Trenckmann to wider historical contexts while also offering necessary background about individual people and events mentioned in the work. Overall, the text's editorial work is superb. Subsequent sections present Trenckmann's own writings. "Erlebtes und Beobachtetes (Experiences and Observations)," appeared intermittently in Trenckmann's German language newspaper, Das Wochenblatt. Published between 1931 and 1933, the memoir proceeds chronologically, beginning with Trenckmann's childhood during the Civil War and concluding with his views of the United States' perspectives on Germany following World War I. Two nostalgic episodes—an 1863 Christmas celebration and Trenckmann's time at Texas A&M—round out the text, followed by a brief selection of primary and secondary sources for further reading. Trenckmann is less concerned with the minutiae of daily life and instead focuses on selected experiences and topics. These include Trenckmann's experiences in Texas's early public education system, the role of Germanlanguage newspapers in consolidating and maintaining German ethnic identity, and German Texan political interests. Permeating the work is a tension at the heart of twentieth-century German Texan life. On one hand, Trenckmann shows how German Texans sought to maintain a distinct ethnic identity by establishing and participating in German festivals, social clubs, and newspapers. On the other, he felt it necessary for German Texans to assimilate into wider American society, particularly through education and by participating in local and state politics. Trenckmann's explicit focus on these themes throughout Preserving German Texan Identity make it a treasure trove for historical and cultural geographers exploring topics of ethnic boosterism and identity formation in the twentieth- century Plains. [End Page 328] Robert Briwa Department of History Angelo State University Copyright © 2021 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska–Lincoln

The German-Language Newspapers in Czernowitz/Cernăuți before and after the First World War

This study aims to review the evolution of the German-language press in Bukovina before and after 1918, trying to answer the question whether this could be considered an emanation of a "colonial" reality in the province annexed after 1774 to the Habsburg Empire and reincorporated with Romania after the First World War. The theoretical perspective offered by postcolonial studies is explored in this essay as it examines the Central European context.

Who Can Speak and Who is Heard/Hurt? Facing Problems of Race, Racism, and Ethnic Diversity in the Humanities in Germany ed. by Mahmoud Arghavan et al.

Reviewed by: Who Can Speak and Who is Heard/Hurt? Facing Problems of Race, Racism, and Ethnic Diversity in the Humanities in Germany ed. by Mahmoud Arghavan et al. Ervin Malakaj Who Can Speak and Who is Heard/Hurt? Facing Problems of Race, Racism, and Ethnic Diversity in the Humanities in Germany. Edited by Mahmoud Arghavan, Nicole Hirschfelder, Luvena Kopp, and Katharina Motyl. Bielefeld: transcript, 2019. Pp. 300. Paper $40.00. ISBN 978-3837641035. The last five years have seen the rise of publications examining the history of and conditions for racism at German universities. This work has appeared in various contexts, including German-language newspapers, reports by public foundations, as well as academic periodicals and scholarly presses. Of note is the advocacy and scholarship of Kien Nghi Ha, Daniela Heitzmann, Kathrin Houda, and Natascha A. Kelly, among others. These scholars and scholar activists have sought to uncover the systemic features in the German education system that complicate or obstruct access to higher education for migrants and People of Color. In effect, their work sought to stimulate additional inquiry about systemic racism in German higher education, hoping to mobilize a wave of critical scholarship in the service of transformative social justice. Who Can Speak and Who is Heard/Hurt? Facing Problems of Race, Racism, and Ethnic Diversity in the Humanities in Germany is firmly positioned in this scholarly and activist landscape. Drawing on critical discourse on diversity work as well as insights from postcolonial, critical race, and decolonial theory, the volume is a comprehensive assessment of structural racism underpinning the teaching and research in the German academy's humanities disciplines. It features a comprehensive introduction and fifteen contributions by scholars and scholar activists working in the German higher education system as well as those with ties to the international academy. In the discussions and debates about systemic racism at German universities, scholarship has productively reflected a paradox also at the heart of Who Can Speak and Who is Heard/Hurt? The volume's editors and contributors make a compelling case for stronger representation of migrant scholars and scholars of color at German universities while recognizing that the racist structure itself is a toxic place for them. For the contributors to the volume, this conundrum requires multiple strategies to advance its call for social justice. On the one hand, it requires dedicated support structures for the migrant scholars and scholars of color currently employed by or enrolled in university programs. By strengthening their success rates and providing representation including at the professoriate rank, universities would strengthen a support structure for future migrant scholars and scholars of color. On the other hand—and this emerges clearly in the introduction of the volume and in select chapters—German universities are not the only place to address an issue part and parcel of the total education system leading to university studies. Of note here is that Germany's three-tiered secondary education system provides multiple structural [End Page 448] hurdles for migrant students and students of color to enter academia. As such, approaches to diversify the academy will have marginal success rates unless they entail strategies to build a secondary education system more attentive to the statuses and lived experiences of migrant students and students of color. Among the merits of the volume is its sharp critique of American studies in Germany. In particular, the editors and contributors deftly demonstrate how even though impulses from US-based American studies form a point of orientation for its German counterpart, the process falls short of embracing some of the US academy's features more conducive to transformative antiracist work: when it comes to scholar activism, the import of US-based models falls short. That is, instead of embracing critical tendencies of postcolonial, decolonial, and critical race theory and directing these to examine the epistemological and pragmatic frameworks of the university itself—as has been done in the US academy through, for example, the #BlackLivesMatter movement—American studies in Germany on the whole subscribes to a purported detached objectivism in the German idealist tradition. The volume rejects scholarly praxes claiming epistemic distance such as those enacted through an insistence on objective truth, arguing that the commitment to...