The Continuities of German History

by Helmut Walser Smith

This book addresses the long term of German history, tracing ideas and politics across what have become sharp chronological breaks. Smith argues that current historiography has become ever more focused on the twentieth century, and on twentieth-century explanations for the German catastrophe. Against conventional wisdom, he considers continuities – in the concept of nation and the ideology of nationalism, in religion and religious exclusion, and in racism and violence – that are the center of the German historical experience and that have long histories. Smith explores these deep continuities in novel ways, emphasizing their importance, while arguing that Germany was not on a special path to destruction. The result is a series of innovative reflections on the crystallization of nationalist ideology, on patterns of anti-Semitism, and on how the nineteenth-century vocabulary of race structured the twentieth-century genocidal imagination.

Genres: History, Religion, Germany, 19th Century, Nonfiction

254 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2008

Reviews

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

Smith's work is an important call for historians not to throw out continuities found in German history, countering the historiographical trend towards the idea of a "shattered" and disjointed German past held by many since the sonderweg debates.

Smith does not intend to resuscitate the idea of a German sonderweg, and rejects the crass eliminationism of Goldhagen. Nevertheless, he presents exhaustive evidence to suggest the interaction between the changing nature of the German nation in the c.19th and the increasingly scientific-racial treatment of Jews during the same period. Changing trends in nationalism and racism culminated in the "vanishing point" of German history circa 1941 and a complete collapse of "fellow feeling" between ordinary 'German' and 'Jew'. The trend was long term, and cannot be treated as a merely c.21st phenomenon.

Interesting Quotes:

1. “A central reference point of German history, a vanishing point in the painterly sense of the term, has shifted from 1933, when Hitler seized power, to 1941, when the genocidal killing of the holocaust commenced… this shift has considerable implications for the writing of German history.” (6)

2. “Memory of the [Jewish] expulsion had a vital place in German culture, especially in local communities, the German hometowns. When debate about Jewish inclusion began, the reaction against it drew on this memory, which had become codified in ritual and in exclusionary practices.” (8)

3. “The new vanishing point suggests wider themes to foreground: how humanity came to think of itself as divided, and some parts less human than others; how the institution of slavery and the prejudice of race gave these human predispositions a long pedigree; how race and nation came in the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to be seen as permanent markers, emblems of unalterable difference; and how these markers justified the enslavement and the cultural and physical extermination of peoples. These are the events of the nineteenth and preceding centuries.” (37)

4.There were three changes over time in the history of anti-Jewish violence:

1- “From anti-Jewish violence centred on the community defending its perceived rights to exclude Jews to anti-Jewish violence whose rationale was nationalistic, culminating in the accusation that Jews were traitors to the nation.”
2- “The transition from the threat of murder to actual murder, from word to dead, speech to act.”
3- “The murderous turn was enabled, and then furthered, by the state.” (117)

5. “Where then does continuity lie? Not in genocide, but in the imagination of expulsion, in the severing of ties to others, and in the violent ideologies, nationalism, anti-Semitism, and racism, that make these things possible to think, support, and enact.” (233)

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's amazing that books like this still get written, especially given the extensive scholarship done on the 19th century in Germany and the development of ideas of race and anti-Semitism in the German states and then after 1870. Smith, a self-loathing German, I guess, contends that anti-Semitism has underpinned German history, identity, and memory since the time of Martin Luther. This is all very nice but unfortunately does not consider any of the aforementioned scholarship (which focuses on the DIScontinuity of the Nazi era in German history) and instead relies on a pseudo-postmodern analysis of how memory is "constructed" and how memory is "remembered". Whatever. Dismissive and simplistic.

[Grub Street Hack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Smith’s goal is to explore how periods of German history connect with each other (3-4) and “how ideas and political forms are traceable across what historians have taken to be the sharp breaks of history” (9). In other words, The Continuities of German History seeks “to construct bridges across chronological chasms” (6).

Smith’s primary argument is a critique on historiographical approaches that focus on particular epochs without meaningful consideration of how earlier periods impact later ones. Instead, Smith argues that historians should be more inclusive by showing how circumambient periods connect to the one under scrutiny—a practice that Smith refers to as continuity. Smith argues that, by focusing on chronological clusters, depth and connections across long spans of time are lost. A failure to include continuity constitutes “a failure of imagination” of the historian, and a “loss of mastery” in the subject (38). Smith centers his argument of inter-epoch connections around nineteenth century Germany. In the latter half of The Continuities of German History, Smith proves his argument by providing an example of continuity through an analysis of the violence against Jews that paralleled changes in nation, religion, and race (12).

Smith makes the case that all historians write their particular histories by means of a vanishing point. In the art world, a vanishing point is the spot on a canvas that determines the relative size of all other objects in the painting (14). Smith uses this term as a metaphor to refer to the central reference point that epitomizes both the efforts of a given historical monograph as well as the doctrine of historical erudition. Smith illustrates the latter point through exhaustive historiographical research that demonstrates a shift among World War II historians. This shift moves the vanishing point from the rise of Hitler in 1933 to the start of the Holocaust in 1941. Smith points out that the vanishing point “generates as well as limits knowledge,” tying the concept back to his primary argument by stating that historians “ought to have historical reach, and this reach ought to encompass periods longer than the lifetime of an individual” (10, 14). Smith also provides an example of continuity by embracing the vanishing point of 1941 and depicting the evolution of antisemitic violence in Germany. His portrayal of antisemitism begins in the sixteenth century, includes an examination of increased rates of antisemitism just after the Thirty Years’ War, an analysis on the steep crescendo of violence in the second half of the nineteenth century, and the depiction of a climax being reached during World War II. By extending his research of antisemitism in Germany across different periods of time, Smith is better equipped to explain the patterns of antisemitism in Germany, and how those patterns are able to culminate with the Holocaust.