Bringing Culture to the Masses

Control, Compromise and Participation in the GDR

Esther von Richthofen

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2009
• eBook ISBN: 9781845458942
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: 20th Century History
• Index: History

Cultural life in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR) was strictly controlled by the ruling party, the SED, who attempted to dictate how people spent their free time by prohibiting privately organized leisure time pursuits and offering instead cultural activities in state institutions and organizations. By exploring the nature of dictatorial rule in the GDR and analysing the population's engagement with state-organized cultural activity, this book challenges the current assumptions about the GDR's social and institutional history that ignore the interaction and inter-dependence between 'rulers' and 'ruled'. The author argues that the people's cultural life in the GDR developed a dynamic of its own; it was determined by their own interests and by the input of cultural functionaries, who often aimed to satisfy popular demands, even if they were at odds with the SED's cultural policy. Gradually, these developments affected SED cultural policy, which in the 1960s became less focused on educationalist goals and increasingly oriented towards popular interests.

Table of contents

• Title page-Bringing Culture to the Masses
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• List of Abbreviations
• Introduction
• Prelude
• Part I-Bending the Rules while Upholding the Structures
• Chapter 1-Neither Puppets noe Opponents
• Chapter 2-Organising Culture
• Part II-Attempted Self-Determination-Pursuing an Interest
• Chapter 3-Patterns of Participation
• Chapter 4-Communication with Cultural Functionaries
• Part III-From Utopianism to Pragmatism
• Chapter 5-Responding to Developments at the Grass Roots
• Chapter 6-From Art to Culture
• Aftermath
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index