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Disorienting Fictions: Antje Rávic Strubel and Post‐Unification East German Identity
Author(s) -
Jeremiah Emily
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
german life and letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.1
H-Index - 12
eISSN - 1468-0483
pISSN - 0016-8777
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0483.2009.01458.x
Subject(s) - german , unification , context (archaeology) , identity (music) , nationalism , queer , art history , history , gender studies , sociology , art , aesthetics , political science , law , politics , archaeology , computer science , programming language
This article explores the work of Antje Rávic Strubel (b. 1974), setting it in the context of recent debates concerning post‐unification East German identity. Drawing on the work of Rosi Braidotti and Sara Ahmed, it defines Strubel's work as ‘nomadic’ and ‘queer’, and explores the novel Offene Blende (2001) in this light. It goes on to examine two male characters in later works by Strubel, Kältere Schichten der Luft and Vom Dorf (both 2007), before briefly investigating Strubel's 2008 guidebook to Sweden. Avoiding both ‘Ostalgie’ and self‐effacement, Strubel's work explores the ‘homelessness’ of the East German in today's Berlin Republic – in particular, that of the older, East German man – but it also suggests the liberating possibilities of this condition, in a manner reminiscent of Braidotti. In addition, Strubel offers a dual challenge to nationalism and heterosexism, paving the way for new understandings of Germanness.