Teutonic time-slip: travels in electronic music, technology, and German identity, 1968-2009

Abstract

"Teutonic Time-Slip" traces intersections between popular electronic music and German identity from 1968 to 2009, examining identity representations in electronic music both as cultural export and import. Broadly speaking, it traces the transformation of Germany's reputation as a nation of classical music to a nation of electronic music. Its history begins with the forming of Krautrock bands amidst the cultural shifts of 1968 and ends with the self-reflective, though fractured, position of German electronic music in 2009, twenty years after German unification. The project demonstrates that electronic music, often considered a purely international music of the computer age, has represented new forms of regional, national, and European identities both within Germany and abroad. Furthermore, the dissertation examines both the construction and political-social critique of German identity through electronic music. It focuses on how German electronic pop emerged in the constant exchange with two distinct musical traditions: first, pop and rock cultures in the United Kingdom and the United States; and second, German classical music and avant-garde electronic music. Finally, as an American scholar, I frame the cultural constellations of musical sound, modern travel, technology, and performance with an examination of constructions of contemporary Germany identity that have been central to the cultural exchange between the United States and Germany.