Bernhard Rieger - Böcker

This book examines the obsession for new technology that swept through Britain and Germany between 1890 and 1945. Drawing on a wide range of popular contemporary writings and pictorial material, it explains how, despite frequently feeling overwhelmed by innovations, Germans and Britons nurtured a long-lasting fascination for aviation, glamorous passenger liners and film as they lived through profound social transformations and two vicious wars. Public discussions about these 'modern wonders' were torn between fears of novel risks and cultural decay on the one hand, and passionate support generated by nationalism and social fantasies on the other. While the investigation focuses on tensions between technophobia and euphoria, the book also examines the relationship between responses to technology and the differing political cultures in Britain and Germany before and after 1933. This innovative study will prove invaluable reading to anyone interested in comparative cultural history as well as the history of technology.

This book examines the obsession for new technology that swept through Britain and Germany between 1890 and 1945. Drawing on a wide range of popular contemporary writings and pictorial material, it explains how, despite frequently feeling overwhelmed by innovations, Germans and Britons nurtured a long-lasting fascination for aviation, glamorous passenger liners and film as they lived through profound social transformations and two vicious wars. Public discussions about these 'modern wonders' were torn between fears of novel risks and cultural decay on the one hand, and passionate support generated by nationalism and social fantasies on the other. While the investigation focuses on tensions between technophobia and euphoria, the book also examines the relationship between responses to technology and the differing political cultures in Britain and Germany before and after 1933. This innovative study will prove invaluable reading to anyone interested in comparative cultural history as well as the history of technology.

At the Berlin Auto Show in 1938, Adolf Hitler presented the prototype for a small, oddly shaped, inexpensive family car that all good Aryans could enjoy. Decades later, that automobile—the Volkswagen Beetle—was one of the most beloved in the world. Bernhard Rieger examines culture and technology, politics and economics, and industrial design and advertising genius to reveal how a car commissioned by Hitler and designed by Ferdinand Porsche became an exceptional global commodity on a par with Coca-Cola.Beyond its quality and low cost, the Beetle’s success hinged on its uncanny ability to capture the imaginations of people across nations and cultures. In West Germany, it came to stand for the postwar “economic miracle” and helped propel Europe into the age of mass motorization. In the United States, it was embraced in the suburbs, and then prized by the hippie counterculture as an antidote to suburban conformity. As its popularity waned in the First World, the Beetle crawled across Mexico and Latin America, where it symbolized a sturdy toughness necessary to thrive amid economic instability.Drawing from a wealth of sources in multiple languages, The People’s Car presents an international cast of characters—executives and engineers, journalists and advertisers, assembly line workers and car collectors, and everyday drivers—who made the Beetle into a global icon. The Beetle’s improbable story as a failed prestige project of the Third Reich which became a world-renowned brand illuminates the multiple origins, creative adaptations, and persisting inequalities that characterized twentieth-century globalization.

While conceptions of the 'modern' have been intensively and fruitfully studied from a variety of perspectives in the context of continental European history, scholars of Britain have hardly addressed the history of the first industrial nation and the world's leading colonial power in this register, despite its enormous cultural influence.In examining British conceptions and expressions of modernity --from Victorian debates about 'national character' to breathtaking exhibitions of artefacts such as the 'moving pavement' that would revolutionize the future appearance of cities, to debates about the impact of new forms of production and consumption, mass communication and travel -- this book fills the gap.Is it true, as Virginia Woolf observed upon seeing the first London exhibition of work by Manet and the Post-Impressionists that 'On or about December 1910 human character changed'? Do men and women experience modernity in the same way? How did contemporaries make sense of the changing social worlds they inhabited?How were conflicting visions of modernity, technology and social change expressed in: advertisements and branding; art, architecture and design; business and commerce; mysticism and mountaineering; new approaches to psychology and the self; and colonial discourse?These wide-ranging issues are addressed by internationally acclaimed experts in the history of science, intellectual history, gender studies, consumption and empire studies. The result is a multifaceted and innovative foray into British cultural history.

Chapters ''BioPBSTM (Polybutylene succinate)'' and ''Polymer biodegradability 2.0: A holistic view on polymer biodegradation in natural and engineered environments'' are available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Chapters ''BioPBSTM (Polybutylene succinate)'' and ''Polymer biodegradability 2.0: A holistic view on polymer biodegradation in natural and engineered environments'' are available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

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