The Photographic Fix: Memory, Ideology, and the First World War in the Weimar Republic
The Photographic Fix: Memory, Ideology, and the First World War in the Weimar Republic
by Justin Court
University of Michigan Press, 2026
ISBNs
Cloth: 978-0-472-07749-6
Paper: 978-0-472-05749-8
eISBN: 978-0-472-90507-2 (OA)
About the Book
The Photographic Fix explores how photographs from World War I were used in personal photo albums and mass-market picture books to determine the meaning and legacy of the postwar Weimar Republic. Due to their publication success and wide reception, picture books should be considered no small part of this broad struggle of ideas to cement the war’s legacy in the Weimar era. Drawing from a large archive of photographs created during the war by amateur soldier-photographers and professional reporters alike, Justin Court explores how visual depictions of the war were used to construct and distort memory in the highly contested realm of war commemoration in the Weimar. These books of photography reveal an effort to shape how the war was visually remembered in order to influence public opinion on myriad matters following in the war’s wake, including notions of German guilt and responsibility, the legitimacy of the Republic, and the political future of the German nation. By utilizing relatively neglected sources, The Photographic Fix expands scholarship on German war photography to illuminate how images from the war and Weimar period reflected the public’s understanding of the medium at the time.
About the Author
Justin Court is Senior Lecturer of German at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.
Reviews
"Deeply researched, richly illustrated, and beautifully written, The Photographic Fix transforms our understanding of what the photobook was and did and makes a major contribution to the cultural history of an enduringly fascinating period of Germany’s recent past. And it is a timely reminder of the manipulative power of the visual media at a moment when right-wing populism is again posing a challenge to Western democracies."— J. J. Long, University of Durham
“The Photographic Fix makes a substantial and important contribution to German studies through use of a fascinating but curiously understudied subject matter: The Great War and German photobooks about it. Court’s study insightfully examines both the individual images and the larger frameworks that affect their significance. This is an interesting, intelligent, and important book that will be of interest to readers in fields such as memory studies, the history of photography, and even military history.”— Daniel H. Magilow, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Tags
Social History, Popular Culture, And Politics In Germany, First World War, Weimar Republic, Memory, Photography, Germany, World, European, Social aspects, Europe, 20th century, Political Science, History
Open Access Information
License: CC BY-NC
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