The World Is My Domain: Technology, Gender, and Orientalism in German Interwar Motorized Adventure Literature

Following Germany's resounding defeat in the First World War, the loss of its status as a colonial power, and the series of severe political and economic upheavals during the interwar years, travel abroad by motor vehicle was one way that Germans sought to renegotiate their place in the world....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Transfers 2011-12, Vol.1 (3), p.44-63
Main Author: Disko, Sasha
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Motorcycles
Technology
Technology application
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Following Germany's resounding defeat in the First World War, the loss of its status as a colonial power, and the series of severe political and economic upheavals during the interwar years, travel abroad by motor vehicle was one way that Germans sought to renegotiate their place in the world. One important question critical studies of mobility should ask is if technologies of mobility contributed to the construction of cultural inequality, and if so in which ways? Although Germans were not alone in using technology to shore up notions of cultural superiority, the adventure narratives of interwar German motorists, both male and female, expressed aspirations for renewed German power on the global stage, based, in part, on the claimed superiority of German motor vehicle technology.
ISSN:2045-4813
2045-4821
DOI:10.3167/trans.2011.010304