Unterhaltung als Eigensinn: Eine ostdeutsche Mediengeschichte

Having received Unterhaltung als Eigensinn, the present reviewer was curious to learn about its content and approach. But while the topic, namely the history of leisure in the German working class, seems worthwhile and interesting, the purpose of the book remains unclear. Mühl-Benninghaus, a widely acknowledged Berlin-based scholar of film and television who co-directed an important collaborative project on the history and aesthetics of GDR television, strives to explain the debates surrounding leisure on the political Left. He focuses on socialist, trade unionist, social democratic and Communist notions of entertainment, free time, education, social mobility and cultural betterment. In doing so, he zeroes in on the German Empire, the often dismissive debates on new media during the Weimar period, and the diverging conceptualization of socialist entertainment in the areas of music, film and broadcasting during the German Democratic Republic. A chapter on the twelve years of Nazi rule is not included. Did leisure in working-class Germany completely vanish during the 1930s? Or is the concept so ambiguous and volatile that Nazi efforts to dominate leisure would fully confuse the book’s overarching narrative, which is centred on challenges to cultural hegemony in different social and political settings until the late 1980s?