Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T12:53:41.148Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

German Gymnastics, Modern German Dance, and Nazi Aesthetics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 August 2016

Marion Kant
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, when Napoleon's French empire conquered much of Europe, the German patriot Friedrich Ludwig Jahn invented the first German national gymnastics program known as Turnen. The idea was to create a new German body and a new form of national discipline. Walking for bodily fitness, to instill national awareness, training on special equipment and rediscovering ancient German dance forms all became part of the new body culture. It is out of this movement with its nationalist and later racist culture that much of the modern gymnastics and dance movements in Germany gained their ideologies. This article sketches some stages of this social and physical continuity, from the resistance to the French to the establishment of the racial state in 1933 and to the provision of a Nazi aesthetic by German modern dancers.

Keywords

aestheticsconservative and Nazi ideologiesGerman modern dancegymnasticsReigenTurnenwalking
Type
Articles
Information
Dance Research Journal , Volume 48 , Issue 2 , August 2016 , pp. 4 - 25
Copyright
Copyright © Congress on Research in Dance 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Works Cited

Adam, Peter. 1992. The Arts of the Third Reich. London: Thames and Hudson.Google Scholar
Ades, Dawn, ed. 1995. Art and Power: Europe under the Dictators, 1930–1945. Exhibition catalogue. London: Thames and Hudson in association with Hayward Gallery.Google Scholar
Adorno, Theodor W. 1966. Negative Dialectics. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar
“The Aesthetics of Fascism.” April 1996. Special Issue of The Journal of Contemporary History, edited by Mosse, George, 31 (2):235–418.Google Scholar
Ascherson, Neal. 1995. “Modernism and the Nazis: A Nightmare.” In Random Access: On Crisis and its Metaphors, edited by Büchler, Pavel and Papastergiadis, Nikos, 69–82. London: Rivers Oram Press.,Google Scholar
Barkai, Avraham. 1990. Nazi Economics: Ideology, Theory, and Policy. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Barron, Stephanie, ed. 1991. ‘Degenerate Art’: The Fate of the Avant-Garde in Nazi Germany. Exhibition catalogue. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art; New York: H. N. Abrams.Google Scholar
Baxmann, Inge. 2000. Mythos Gemeinschaft. Körper- und Tanzkulturen in der Moderne. Munich: W Fink Verlag.Google Scholar
Bode, Rudolf. 1926. Neue Wege in der Leibeserziehung. Munich: Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung.Google Scholar
Bode, Rudolf. 1933a. “Richtlinien der Fachgruppe Körperbildung und Tanz Reichsverband Deutscher Turn-, Sport- und Gymnastiklehrer im NS.-Lehrerbund: Fachschaft Gymnastik und Tanz.” In Sonderdruck der Deutschen Kultur-Wacht, dem Reichsorgan des Kampfbundes für Deutsche Kultur.Google Scholar
Bode, Rudolf. 1933b. Aufgaben und Ziele der rhythmischen Gymnastik. Munich: Beck'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung.Google Scholar
Bodmer, Sylvia. 1986. “Interview with Valerie Preston-Dunlop whilst watching “Laban Kammertanz 1986.” https://vimeo.com/79971880, accessed April 15, 2015.Google Scholar
Boldt-Elbing, A. 1884. “Etwas über den heutigen Stand der Mädchen Gymnastik in Ost- und Westpreussen.” Monatsschrift für das Turnwesen 3(7): 185–208.Google Scholar
Böhme, Fritz. 1928. Entsiegelung der Geheimnisse, Zeichen der Seele: Zur Metaphysik der Bewegung. Berlin: Kinetischer Verlag.Google Scholar
Böhme, Fritz. 1932. Note. Dance Archive Leipzig. Rep. 019 IV a. L No.1. Unpublished manuscript. April 23.Google Scholar
Böhme, Fritz. 1933. “Ist das Ballett deutsch?” Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung. April 25.Google Scholar
Böhme, Fritz. 2004. “To Reichsminister for Propaganda and Popular Enlightenment [sic], Dr. Goebbels. November 8, 1933.” In Hitler's Dancers, edited by Karina, Lilian and Kant, Marion, 197–199. Oxford, UK: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Brandenburg, Hans. 1934. “Von deutscher Tanzkunst.” In Deutsche Tanzfestspiele 1934, edited by von Laban, Rudolf. Dresden: Deutsche Tanzbühne. Google Scholar
Clinefelter, Joan. 2005. Artists for the Reich: Culture and Race from Weimar to Nazi Germany. New York: Berg.Google Scholar
Dahm, Annkatrin. 2007. Der Topos der Juden: Studien zur Geschichte des Antisemitismus im deutschsprachigen Musikschrifttum. Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darwin, Charles. 1859. On the Origin of Species. London: John Murray.Google Scholar
Dennis, David B. 2012. Inhumanities: Nazi Interpretations of Western Culture. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Düding, Dieter. 1984. Organisierter gesellschaftlicher Nationalismus in Deutschland (1808–1847): Bedeutung und Funktion der Turner- und Sängervereine für die deutsche Nationalbewegung. München: Oldenbourg.Google Scholar
Duncan, Isadora. 1969. “I See America Dancing.” In The Art of the Dance, edited by Cheney, Sheldon, 49–50. New York: Theatre Arts Books.Google Scholar
Etlin, Richard, ed. 2002. Art, Culture, and Media under the Third Reich. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Euler, Carl. 1845. Über die Nothwendigkeit und die Art der Organisation des Militair-Wesens, Cologne: Lengfeld.Google Scholar
Euler, Carl. 1884. “Reigen zu dem Liede ‘Vom Fels zum Meer.’” Monatsschrift für das Turnwesen 3 (5): 121–131.Google Scholar
Euler, Carl. 1885a. “Zwei Reigen, I.” Monatsschrift für das Turnwesen 4(1–2): 15–17.Google Scholar
Euler, Carl. 1885b. “Zwei Reigen, II.” Monatsschrift für das Turnwesen 4(8–9): 223–228.Google Scholar
Evans, Richard J. 2005. The Third Reich in Power: 1933–1939, London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Fichte, Johann Gottlieb. 1922. Addresses to the German Nation. Translated by Jones, Reginald F. and Turnbull, George H.. Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Fulbrook, Mary. 1991. Divided Nation: A History of Germany, 1918–1990. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gadberry, Glen W., ed. 1995. Theatre in the Third Reich, the Prewar Years: Essays on Theatre in Nazi Germany. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.Google Scholar
Gentile, Emilio. 2005. The Origins of Fascist Ideology, 1918–1925. New York: Enigma Books.Google Scholar
Goltermann, Svenja. 1998. Körper der Nation: Habitusformierung und die Politik des Turnens, 1860–1890. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.Google Scholar
Griffin, Roger. 2007. Modernism and Fascism: The Sense of a Beginning under Mussolini and Hitler. London: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grimm, Jacob, and Grimm, Wilhelm. 1854–1961. Deutsches Wörterbuch, 16 vols. Leipzig. http://woerterbuchnetz.de/DWB/.Google Scholar
Guilbert, Laure. 2011. Danser avec le Troisième Reich: Les danseurs modernes sous le Nazism. Paris: Versailles Editeurs.Google Scholar
Habermas, Jürgen. Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit: Untersuchungen zu einer Kategorie der bürgerlichen Gesellschaft. Neuwied am Rhein: Luchterhand 1962.Google Scholar
Hardt, Yvonne. 2005. “Ausdruckstanz und die Ästhetisierung des Arbeiterkörpers.” In Leibhaftige Moderne: Körper und Kunst in Massenmedien, 1918–1933, edited by Cowan, Michael and Sicks, Kai Marcel, 245–263. Bielefeld: Transcript.Google Scholar
Hardt, Yvonne. 2006. “Ausdruckstanz und Bewegungschor im Nationalsozialismus: Zur politischen Dimension des Körperlichen und Räumlichen im modernen Tanz.” In Körper im Nationalsozialismus. Bilder und Praxen, edited by Diehl, Paula, 173–190. Paderborn: Fink.Google Scholar
Hermand, Jost. 1992. Old Dreams of a New Reich: Völkisch Utopias and National Socialism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Hermand, Jost. 2013. Culture in Dark Times: Nazi Fascism, Inner Emigration, and Exile. New York: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Hobsbawm, Eric, and Ranger, Terence, eds. 1992. The Invention of Tradition Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig. 1810. Deutsches Volkstum. Lübeck: Nieman.Google Scholar
Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig. 1816. Deutsche Turnkunst. Munich: Matthes & Seitz.Google Scholar
Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig. 1828. Neue Runenblätter. Naumburg: Wild'sche Buchhandlung.Google Scholar
Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig. 1833. Merke zum Deutschen Volksthum. Hildburghausen: Knopf.Google Scholar
Jahn, Friedrich Ludwig. 1847. Turnkunst (3rd ed).Google Scholar
James, David. 2011. Fichte's Social and Political Philosophy: Property and Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jaques-Dalcroze, Emile. 1907. Der Rhythmus als Erziehungsmittel für das Leben und die Kunst. Basel: Helbig & Lichtenhahn.Google Scholar
Jaques-Dalcroze, Emile. 1915. The Eurhythmics of Jaques-Dalcroze. Boston: Small Maynard.Google Scholar
Jooss, Kurt. 1928. “Tanztheater/Theatertanz: Speech given at the Dancers’ Congress.” In Jeder Mensch ist ein Tänzer: Ausdruckstanz in Deutschland zwischen 1900 und 1945, edited by Müller, Hedwig and Stöckemann, Patricia, 76–78. Wetzlar: Anabas Verlag, 1993.Google Scholar
Jusdanis, Gregory. 2001. The Necessary Nation. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Karina, Lilian, and Kant, Marion. (1996) 2004. Hitler's Dancers: German Dancers and the Third Reich. Oxford, New York: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Kant, Marion. 2000. “German Dance and the Concept of Criticism.” In Être ensemble: Figures de la communauté en danse depuis le XX siècle, 143–164. Paris: Centre National de la Danse.Google Scholar
Kant, Marion. 2011. “The Moving Body and the Will to Culture.” European Review 19(4): 419–432.Google Scholar
Kater, Michael. 2000. Composers of the Nazi Era: Eight Portraits. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Kater, Michael H., and Riethmüller, Albrecht, eds. 2003. Music and Nazism: Art under Tyranny, 1933–1945. Laaber: Laaber.Google Scholar
Koegler, Horst. 1973. “Mary Wigman: Tänzerin der Weimarer Republik.” Theater heute 11: 1–4.Google Scholar
Koepnick, Lutz. January 1999. “Fascist Aesthetics Revisited.” modernism/modernity, 6/1:52–70. https://muse.jhu.edu/article/23257, accessed January 1, 2016.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kohn, Hans. 1949. “Father Jahn's Nationalism.” The Review of Politics 11(4): 419–432.Google Scholar
Laban, Rudolf von. 1920. Die Welt des Tänzers, Stuttgart: Walter Seifert.Google Scholar
Laban, Rudolf von. 1926a. Gymnastik und Tanz. Oldenburg i.O.: Gerhard Stalling Verlag.Google Scholar
Laban, Rudolf von. 1926b. Des Kindes Gymnastik und Tanz. Oldenburg i.O.: Gerhard Stalling Verlag.Google Scholar
Laban, Rudolf von. 1928. “Vortrag in der Berliner Universität 1. April 1928.” NRCD Laban Archive, Dance in General E (L) 20, 2 MS.Google Scholar
Lämmel, Rudolf. 1928. Der moderne Tanz. Berlin.Google Scholar
Leonard, Fred Eugene. 1918. The Playground Movement in Germany. New York: Society of Directors of Physical Education in College.Google Scholar
Levi, Eric. 1994. Music in the Third Reich. Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Levinson, André. 1929. “The Modern Dance in Germany.” Theatre Arts Monthly 2: 143–153.Google Scholar
London, John, ed. 2000. Theatre under the Nazis. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press.Google Scholar
Manning, Susan. 1995. “Modern Dance in the Third Reich: Six Positions and a Coda.” In Choreographing History, edited by Foster, Susan L, 165–176. Bloomington & Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Manning, Susan. 2006. Ecstasy and the Demon: The Dances of Mary Wigman. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Manning, Susan. 2012. “Looking back again, and again.” Presented at Autour de l'historiographie de la danse moderne allemande: État de lieux et perspectives, Nice, France.Google Scholar
Matthias, E. 1913. “Kann Jaques-Dalcroze ein Schulfach werden?” In Schweizerische pädagogische Zeitung 23: 335–353.Google Scholar
Michaud, Eric. 2004. The Cult of Art in Nazi Germany. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Michel, Artur. 1924. Der absolute Tanz. Vossische Zeitung (February 5): 2–3.Google Scholar
Mosse, George. 1966/1991. The Crisis of German Ideology: Intellectual Origins of the Third Reich. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Translated as Die völkische Revolution: Über die geistigen Wurzeln des Nationalsozialismus. Frankfurt/M: Anton Hain.Google Scholar
Müller, Hedwig, and Stöckemann, Patricia, eds. 1993. Jeder Mensch ist ein Tänzer: Ausdruckstanz in Deutschland zwischen 1900 und 1945. Wetzlar: Anabas Verlag.Google Scholar
Neumann, Franz L. 1944. Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism, 1933–1944. London: Victor Gollancz.Google Scholar
Organisationskomittee für die XI. Olympiade Berlin 1936. 1937. Official Report, vol. 2. Berlin: Wilhelm Limpert.Google Scholar
Peters, Kurt. 1992. “Einführung.” In Ausdruckstanz: Eine mitteleuropäische Bewegung der ersten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts, edited by Oberzaucher-Schüller, Gunhild, 1–14. Wilhelmshaven: Florian Noetzel.Google Scholar
Peters, Olaf, ed. 2014. Degenerate Art: The Attack on Modern Art in Nazi Germany, 1937. Munich: Prestel.Google Scholar
Petropoulos, Jonathan. 1996. Art as Politics in the Third Reich. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Petropoulos, Jonathan. 2001. The Faustian Bargain: The Art World in Nazi Germany. London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Petropoulos, Jonathan. 2014. Artists under Hitler: Collaboration and Survival in Nazi Germany. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Rauschning, Hermann. 1938/1939. Die Revolution des Nihilismus: Kulisse und Wirklichkeit im Dritten Reich. Zürich: Europa Verlag. Translated as Revolution of Nihilism: Warning to the West. London: William Heinemann. Google Scholar
Reigen und Liederreigen für das Schulturnen aus dem Nachlasse von Adolf Spiess. 1869. Edited by Driedrich Wassmannsdorff, Karl Wilhelm. Frankfurt/M: J. D. Sauerländer's Verlag.Google Scholar
Ruprecht, Lucia. August 2015. “Gesture, Interruption, Vibration: Rethinking the Gestural Theory and Practice in Walter Benjamin, Rudolf von Laban, and Mary Wigman.” Dance Research Journal 47(2): 23–42.Google Scholar
Sarkowicz, Hans, ed. 2004. Hitlers Künstler: Die Kultur im Dienst des Nationalsozialismus. Frankfurt/Main: Insel.Google Scholar
Schenk, Michael. 1999. “Karl Storck (1873–1920): Zwischen Kulturpolitik, Musikpädagogik und Chauvinismus!” In Musikpädagogik vor neuen Forschungsaufgaben, edited by Knolle, Niels, 125–166. Essen: Die Blaue Eule.Google Scholar
Schöning, Margret. 1929–1933. Album. Archive of Modern Conflict. London A 7820.Google Scholar
Schulte-Sasse, Linda. 1991. “Leni Riefenstahl's Feature Films and the Question of a Fascist Aesthetic.” Cultural Critique 18(1): 123–148.Google Scholar
Spotts, Frederic. 2003. Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics. London: Hutchinson.Google Scholar
Steinberg, Jonathan. 1990. All or Nothing: The Axis and the Holocaust. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Steinweis, Alan E. 1993. Art, Ideology, and Economics in Nazi Germany: The Reich Chambers of Music, Theater, and the Visual Arts. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Caroline Press.Google Scholar
Stern, Fritz. 1961–63. The Politics of Cultural Despair: A Study in the Rise of the Germanic Ideology. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Storck, Karl. 1903. Der Tanz. Sammlung illustrierter Monographien. Bielefeld and Leipzig: Velhagen and Klasing.Google Scholar
Storck, Karl. 1912. E. Jaques-Dalcroze: Seine Stellung und Aufgabe in unserer Zeit. Stuttgart: Greiner & Pfeiffer.Google Scholar
Strathausen, Carsten. 1999. “Nazi Aesthetics.” Renaissance and Modern Studies 42(1): 5–19.Google Scholar
Sypnowich, Christine. 2014. “Law and Ideology.” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Zalta, Edward N.. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2014/entries/law-ideology/. Accessed April 11, 2016.Google Scholar
Toepfer, Karl. 1997. Empire of Ecstasy: Nudity and Movement in German Body Culture, 1910–1935. Berkeley: California University Press.Google Scholar
Tönnies, Ferdinand. 1887. Gesellschaft und Gemeinschaft. Leipzig: Fues's Verlag.Google Scholar
von Gossler, V. 1884. “Erwiderung des Kultusministers.” Monatschrift für das Turnwesen 3(3): 81–82.Google Scholar
Wagner, Richard. 1849. Kunst und Revolution. Leipzig: Wigand.Google Scholar
Wagner, Richard. 1850. Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft. Leipzig: Wigand.Google Scholar
Wagner, Richard. 1852. Oper und Drama. Leipzig: Verlagsbuchhandlung Weber.Google Scholar
Wagner, Richard. 1869. “Das Judenthum in der Musik.” Neue Zeitschrift für Musik. Originally published under pseudonym K. Freigedank in 1850. Leizpig: Verlagsbuchhandlung Weber.Google Scholar
Wassmannsdorff, Karl Wilhelm Friedrich. 1869. Reigen und Liederreigen für das Schulturnen aus dem Nachlasse von Adolf Spiess. Frankfurt/M: J. D. Sauerländer's Verlag.Google Scholar
Wedemeyer-Kolwe, Bernd. 2004. Der neue Mensch: Körperkultur im Kaiserreich und in der Weimarer Republik. Würzburg: Verlag Königshausen & Neumann.Google Scholar
Welch, David. 2004. “Nazi Propaganda and the Volksgemeinschaft: Constructing a People's Community.” Journal of Contemporary History, Understanding Nazi Germany 39(2): 213–238.Google Scholar
Wigman, Mary. 1921. “Der Tanz als Kunstwerk.” Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, Unterhaltungsblatt, March 9, 1921.Google Scholar
Wigman, Mary. 1929. “Das Land ohne Tanz: Reply to Levinson.”: Die Tanzgemeinschaft: Vierteljahreszeitschrift für tänzerische Kultur 1(2): 12–13.Google Scholar
Wigman, Mary. 1928/1993. “Der neue künstlerische Tanz und das Theater.” Speech given at the Dancers’ Congress in Essen, 1928. In: Jeder Mensch ist ein Tänzer: Ausdruckstanz in Deutschland zwischen 1900 und 1945, edited by Müller, Hedwig and Stöckemann, Patricia, 77–82. Wetzlar: Anabas Verlag.Google Scholar
Wigman, Mary. 1936. Deutsche Tanzkunst. Dresden: C Reissner.Google Scholar
Winther, Fritz H. 1922. Der rhythmische Mensch. Rudolstadt.Google Scholar
Wobbe, Eva. 1992. “Die Gymnastik.” In: Ausdruckstanz: Eine mitteleuropäische Bewegung der ersten Häfte des 20. Jahrhunderts, edited by Oberzaucher-Schüller, Gunhild, 25–32. Wilhelmshaven: Florian Noetzel.Google Scholar