4 - Germany in Language Textbooks

Summary

Chapter 4 studies the portrayals of Germany in language textbooks. Although language textbooks attracted relatively few readers, that German studies had an audience in Japan after World War I attests to Japanese appreciation of German civilization. Yet, because of linguistic differences between Japanese and German, interwar German’s peculiarities, and limitations in instruction methods, German in Japan suffered from a notoriety of being difficult and boring. But German was considered so useful that many Japanese attempted to teach themselves the language. Germanists responded by churning out numerous publications, each purporting to be the key to overcoming the German problem. Moreover, these linguists used their control of German lessons to express their political preference for a monarchist, nationalistic, and martial Germany. Once Hitler rose to power, more and more language teachers incorporated Nazi phrases, images, and concepts in textbooks. Indeed, across the entire media linguists manifested transnational Nazism most pronouncedly and thoroughly through their voluntary Gleichschaltung to become advocates of Hitler and his ideology in Japan.