IN THE DECADE or so following the First World War the United States of America exercised both economic and cultural influence upon Germany, and in the process became one of the enduring subjects of debate in Weimar culture. The words “Amerika” and “Amerikanismus,” the term most commonly used to describe the uncritical reception and duplication of what were seen as American attitudes, became ciphers for anxieties that reveal many of the fault lines within German culture during the 1920s. The resultant reflection upon this phenomenon, conducted in countless articles and books and visible equally in literary and cinematic products of the era, shows a desire for modernity alongside, paradoxically, a stubborn resistance to change. This article re-examines the phenomenon of “Amerikanismus” in the Weimar Republic, and explores the cultural and historical reasons why one's response to it became de facto a test of one's faith in the German Republic. For my conclusions I draw on a range of published evidence, both literary and nonliterary, and end with an assessment of the ways in which discourses associated with America were of decisive importance in shaping not only depictions of America but literary prose fiction in general in the era of the Neue Sachlichkeit. Throughout, the article attempts to relate the phenomenon of “Amerikanismus” to questions of “national” culture, identity and modernity.

Amerikanismus: From Economic to Cultural Influence

America's practical contribution to Germany's recovery from the War is of course undeniable.