Nation and Identity in the New German Cinema: Homeless at Home (Electronic book text)

Nation and Identity in the New German Cinema investigates the construction of national identity in films of the New German Cinema using - for the first time - an explicitly cultural studies methodology. Specifically, Scharf's investigation is concerned with national identity constructions in West German film 1961-1989. According to Scharf's cultural studies (rather than a film studies) approach, film has to be situated within a wider social context in order to be addressed, rather than articulated simply as a work of art, which needs to be analysed for its own sake. Moreover, the national and the cinematic realm are conceptualised as imaginary spaces which overlap and constructively interpenetrate one another through complex narrative processes.