“Bunkered Landscapes and the Search for Peace in Post-World War II Berlin”

World War II was an urban war.  Increasingly targeting civilians, this war inflicted tremendous physical destruction and human suffering on cities worldwide. This talk focuses on the history of air-raid bunkers in Berlin to illustrate the linkages between war, ideology, and the urban environment. After twelve years of war, mass killing, and dictatorship, many cities lay in ruins. After such an experience of war, violence and devastation, how was it possible to return to a sense of peace? What role did urban environments, particularly bunkers and their afterlives, play in this search for peace? Focusing on air raid bunkers, this presentation examines how they were dealt with after the war and which challenges they posed to the reconstruction of the city.  In particular, Dr. Brantz will look at the so-called rubble mountains that were created to get rid of the excessive amounts of rubble all over the city, but also to cover up former bunkers and other Nazi military installations. How were these integrated into the postwar landscape of Berlin and what symbolic meaning did they hold for the historical commemoration of the NS regime and WW II?

This presentation seeks to foster a critical debate about the conceptualization of war and peace as well as historical memory in urban areas and the role of the environment in it.

Dorothee Brantz is professor for urban history and director of the Center for Metropolitan Studies at the TU Berlin.  From 2005-2007 she was an assistant professor at UB in the Department of History.  Her research centers on urban environmental history. Currently she is working on a project about the role of nature in the transition from war to peace in Berlin.

Sponsored by UB’s Graduate Group in German and Austrian Studies