Books by "Michael H. Kater"

4 books found

Jazz & the Germans

Jazz & the Germans

by Michael J. Budds

2002 · Pendragon Press

Many commentators have observed that the influence of jazz and related popular musics on musical practice beyond American borders should be considered one of the most dynamic developments of the twentieth century. This collection of essays concentrates on American influences in Germany, where such unlikely "foreign" elements enjoyed a remarkable vogue for much of the past century, not only in the realm of popular culture but in the realm of the arts as well. Against the tumultuous social and political upheavals of modern Germany there evolved a fascinating musical sound track that introduced German musicians and their public to ragtime, spirituals, the blues, later dance music, and jazz with resulting opportunities for imitation and assimilation. In this volume American scholars from various academic perspectives are joined by German musician-scholars.

War, Pacification, and Mass Murder, 1939

War, Pacification, and Mass Murder, 1939

by Jürgen Matthäus, Jochen Böhler, Klaus-Michael Mallmann

2014 · Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published in association with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum This invaluable work traces the role of the Einsatzgruppen of the Security Police and SD, the core group of Himmler’s murder units involved in the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question,” during and immediately after the German campaign in Poland in 1939. In addition to relevant Einsatzgruppen reports, the book includes key documents from other sources, especially eyewitness accounts from victims or onlookers. Such accounts provide an alternative, often much more realistic, perspective on the nature and consequences of the actions previously known only through documentation generated by the perpetrators. With carefully selected primary sources contextualized by the authors’ clear narrative, this work fills an important gap in our understanding of a crucial period in the evolution of policies directed against Jews, Poles, and others deemed dangerous or inferior by the Third Reich. Supplemented by maps and photographs, this book will be an essential reference and research tool.

The Racial State

The Racial State

by Michael Burleigh, Wolfgang Wippermann

1991 · Cambridge University Press

This book deals with the ideas and institutions which underpinned the Nazi regime's attempt to restructure a 'class' society along racial lines.

Shattered Past

Shattered Past

by Konrad H. Jarausch, Michael Geyer

2009 · Princeton University Press

Broken glass, twisted beams, piles of debris--these are the early memories of the children who grew up amidst the ruins of the Third Reich. More than five decades later, German youth inhabit manicured suburbs and stroll along prosperous pedestrian malls. Shattered Past is a bold reconsideration of the perplexing pattern of Germany's twentieth-century history. Konrad Jarausch and Michael Geyer explore the staggering gap between the country's role in the terrors of war and its subsequent success as a democracy. They argue that the collapse of Communism, national reunification, and the postmodern shift call for a new reading of the country's turbulent development, one that no longer suggests continuity but rupture and conflict. Comprising original essays, the book begins by reexamining the nationalist, socialist, and liberal master narratives that have dominated the presentation of German history but are now losing their hold. Treated next are major issues of recent debate that suggest how new kinds of German history might be written: annihilationist warfare, complicity with dictatorship, the taming of power, the impact of migration, the struggle over national identity, redefinitions of womanhood, and the development of consumption as well as popular culture. The concluding chapters reflect on the country's gradual transition from chaos to civility. This penetrating study will spark a fresh debate about the meaning of the German past during the last century. There is no single master narrative, no Weltgeist, to be discovered. But there is a fascinating story to be told in many different ways.