Long overlooked by scholars and critics, the history and aesthetics of German television have only recently begun to attract serious, sustained attention, and then largely within Germany. This ambitious volume, the first in English on the subject, provides a much-needed corrective in the form of penetrating essays on the distinctive theories, practices, and social-historical contexts that have defined television in Germany. Encompassing developments from the dawn of the medium through the Cold War and post-reunification, this is an essential introduction to a rich and varied media tradition.

Long overlooked by scholars and critics, the history and aesthetics of German television have only recently begun to attract serious, sustained attention, and then largely within Germany. This ambitious volume, the first in English on the subject, provides a much-needed corrective in the form of penetrating essays on the distinctive theories, practices, and social-historical contexts that have defined television in Germany. Encompassing developments from the dawn of the medium through the Cold War and post-reunification, this is an essential introduction to a rich and varied media tradition.

List of Figures

Introduction
Larson Powell and Robert Shandley

PART I: TECHNICAL PREHISTORY AND THEORETICAL APPROACHES

Chapter 1. Contingencies and Ruptures in the Technological History of Television
Wolfgang Hagen

Chapter 2. Boredom, War and Paradox: German Theories of Television
Larson Powell

PART II: GDR TELEVISION

Chapter 3. ‘Just Like in the West, Except Different:’ Television and its Relationship to Film in the Context of 1950s GDR Development
Thomas Beutelschmidt

Chapter 4. Adventures in Stagnation: Gottfried Kolditz’s Unfilmed Project Zimtpiraten
Evan Torner

PART III: TELEVISION IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC: AUTEURIST TV

Chapter 5. “A challenge, maybe the greatest for a filmmaker”: Televisual Perspectives on Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s Martha (1974)
Brad Prager

Chapter 6. Nah am Fern: Kluge TV
Stefanie Harris

PART IV: PRESENT AND FUTURE PERSPECTIVES

Chapter 7.  Television History in Germany: Media-Political and Media-Ethical Aspects  
Rüdiger Steinmetz

Chapter 8. Germany as TV Show Import Market
Lothar Mikos

Chapter 9. Heritage, Heimat, and German Historical ‘Event Television’: Nico Hofmann’s teamWorx
Paul Cooke

Chapter 10. Once Upon a Crime: Tatort, Germany’s Longest Running Police Procedural
Bärbel Göbel-Stolz

Bibliography