This book examines the pioneering radio broadcasts and television documentaries about the United States made in the 1950s by the influential West German journalist Peter von Zahn. Part intellectual biography, part analysis of significant debates in West Germany, part study of an intensive encounter with the United States, the book helps explain the transformation of postwar West Germany. As a soldier in the Wehrmacht in World War II, Zahn held the militantly elitist views typical of young men in Germany's educated middle class. He reconsidered these positions in his postwar broadcasts. At the same time he coldly assessed the capacity of the United States to win the Cold War. His broadcasts examined McCarthyism, the African-American civil rights movement, and numerous aspects of American culture and politics. Zahn's broadcasts were one important voice in West German debates about the defects and virtues of modern democratic societies and especially of the United States, debates whose intensity reflected recent German experiences with the failure of the Weimar Republic and with Nazism. Zahn's analyses of the United States remain startlingly relevant today.

Provides an intellectual biography of television and radio broadcaster Peter von Zahn in the mid-twentieth century Examines the strengths and weaknesses of American government, society, and culture in the 1950s Analyses significant debates to help explain the transformation of postwar West Germany

Autorentext

Eli Nathans is Associate Professor of European History at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada. He has previously published books on the history of German citizenship policies and the career of a senior official in the Nazi administration of justice.

Inhalt
Chapter 1. Introduction.- Part One: Propaganda and Journalism.- Chapter 2. Student and Soldier in the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany.- Chapter 3. Survival.- Chapter 4. Journalist at the Northwest German Radio Station.- Part Two: Networks and Contexts.- Chapter 5. Public Audiences and Official Networks.- Chapter 6. Critical Images of the United States in the Federal Republic.- Part Three: Peter von Zahn's America.- Chapter 7. Tradition and Modernity in American Culture and Society.- Chapter 8. American Public Opinion: Optimistic but often Ignorant.- Chapter 9. A Weak Executive, an Irresponsible Congress, and a Courageous Judiciary.- Chapter 10. From Understanding to Indignation: Zahn on American Racism and the Civil Rights Movement.- Part Four: Receptions.- Chapter 11. Audience Responses.- Chapter 12. A Difficult Return to West Germany 1964-2001.- Chapter 13. Conclusion.- Index.