Introduction: Ghetto Discourses and German Mediascapes

Summary

Für die sind wir Kanaken, unterhaltend, sowas wie das Leben der Boheme oder harsches Gossenelend, sowas wie Anheizer vonnem Partyevent, sowas wie Judenschneider im geflickten Rock … so ist das gewünschte Angst, so wollen sie Straßenquill und Ghettoballern, um aus dem Kullern inner Öde wegzuknallen. Der erste Schuß dröhnt sehr laut. … Da grölt n Lämmerchor: Wir haben's doch schon immer gewußt, und jetzt wird der Türke auf unserm Boden rotzefrech.

[For them we are Kanaken, entertaining, something like the bohemian life or the harsh life on the streets, something like the instigator of the party event, something like the Jewish tailor in the patched-up suit, … in that way, this is the fear they wish for, they want the street-stuff and the ghetto shooters, to shoot their boredom off their streets. The first shot is very loud … then a lambs' choir is chanting: we always knew it, and now the Turk is becoming cheeky in our country.]

Mediascapes and Changing German Cityscapes

THE ABOVE QUOTE FROM FERIDUN ZAIMOGLU'S 1998 publication Koppstoff, a collection of protocols written by Turkish-German women, describes how the Germans understand their Others: as the “life on the streets,” as “ghetto shooters,” as a multicultural, Bohemian fantasy. The Germans use the Kanaken, a derogatory term for Turks in Germany, for entertainment, as action figures, as a kind of drug against boredom, as adding flavor. But conveniently these images can also justify exclusion: when the Turks' “shots” get too loud, what until then constituted their entertainment value quickly becomes the reason for their continued exclusion.