LEADER 03594ctm a2200373Ia 4500001    209179
005    20240621212332.0
008    100331s2008    xx       b    000 0 eng d
035    (OCoLC)ocn662735462
035    209179
049    LHMA
040    LHM |beng |erda |cLHM
090    DD237 |b.B79 2008
100 1  Bryden, Eric Jefferson.
245 10 In search of founding fathers : |brepublican historical narratives in Weimar Germany, 1918-1933 / |cby Eric Jefferson Bryden.
264  0  |c2008.
300    viii, 380 pages
336    text |btxt |2rdacontent
337    unmediated |bn |2rdamedia
338    volume |bnc |2rdacarrier
502    Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Davis, 2008.
504    Includes bibliographical references (pages 367-380).
520     For the entirety of its short life, supporters of the Weimar Republic, Germany's first liberal democratic state, sought to defend it against their right-wing opposition's claims that the Republic and the liberal democratic ideas it rested on were foreign imports lacking roots in German history and culture. To do so, republicans endeavored to depict Weimar as heir to a myriad of political institutions, ideas, and practices in the national past, stretching from Germans' tribal roots to the end of the First World War, with a pronounced emphasis on the legacy of the constitutional and democratic-national movement of the Vormärz and the Revolution of 1848/49.Using interpretive insights gleaned from recent and classical theories of political legitimation, collective memory, and historical narration, this dissertation examines republican Geschichtsbilder and four interrelated thematic "threads" embedded within them: the cultural, the constitutional, the democratic, and the national. It analyzes how republicans promoted their own democratic definition of the nation, whose most notable achievements were cultural rather than military, at the same time that they sought to prove the "national" roots of liberal democratic ideas and practices. It also sheds light on differences between moderate and militant republican historical narratives, particularly in their respective evaluations of Germany's monarchical past and its relation to national political development. Militant republicans, organized in associations such as the Reichsbanner Schwarz Rot Gold, often attacked the monarchical tradition, both as a general institution and as embodied by individual rulers. Moderates trod more softly, in large part to avoid further alienating members of the bourgeois right from the new political order. By examining both the differences among Weimar's supporters and their common attempt to marshal Germany history for the benefit of the Republic, this project sheds light on an important, yet poorly researched, aspect of republican state-building while providing important insights into Weimar political culture as a whole.
530    Electronic version(s)  |bavailable internally at USHMM.
533    Photocopy. |bAnn Arbor, Mich. : |cUMI Dissertation Services. |e22 cm.
590     Dissertations and Theses
591    Record updated by Marcive processing 21 June 2024
651  0 Germany |xHistory |y1918-1933.
651  0 Germany |xPolitics and government |y1918-1933.
856 41  |uhttp://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=1820015131&sid=1&Fmt=6&clientId=54617&RQT=309&VName=PQD |zElectronic version from ProQuest
956 41  |uhttp://dc.ushmm.org/library/bib209179/3362473.pdf   |zHosted by USHMM.
852 0   |bstacks |hDD237 |i.B79 2008
852     |bwww
852     |bebook