A Deterritorialized History: Investigating German Colonialism ...

Through such cultural deterritorialization and reterritorialization, Germany’s interaction
with Africa shaped the cultural history of Germany.
Although Germans happily consumed these expressions of the African exotic and
as striking as these interactions were, the broad impact of colonial cultural propaganda
was minimal. The continually-reiterated focus upon developing popular awareness of the
colonies in order to secure increased government funding and intervention demonstrates
how the various colonial social organizations viewed the apathy of the populace. Yet the
cultural propaganda ultimately failed in that it never garnered much support for
expansion. The expressions of colonial deterritorialization in the cultural sphere were
therefore reterritorialized through public ambivalence.
There was an additional deterritorialization of cultures through the transplanting
of people and not just German emigration. A substantial number of Africans also
traveled to Germany, such as the young men who were brought from the colonies to
assist advertising in the Kolonialhaus. 84 Through this cultural exchange, Africans
deterritorialized some elements of Africa to Germany. In this respect, Bechhaus-Gerst
and Klein-Arendt’s ideas of the importance of encounters between African and German
introduce a neglected dynamic within colonialism. 85 Likewise, in Africa the introduction
of German culture, like the introduction of German social values, prompted a re-assertion
of traditional African culture alongside a syncretic assimilation of favourable elements of
European culture. 86 This reciprocation problematizes the notion of colonial metropolis
and periphery as cultural flows traveled back and forth in a manner similar to Bhabha’s
vision of colonial mimicry. 87 Yet this cultural assimilation was not just the creation of
alterity that was essential to colonial domination, but also suggests syncretism in culture.
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