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Looking after One's Own is a political history of a German mission society during the last years of the Weimar Republic. It investigates the gradual engagement of the Neuendettelsauer Lutherans in Bavaria with National Socialism, and the tensions between this development and the restructuring of the Lutheran mission fields in New Guinea between 1929 and the early 1930s. It is an interdisciplinary, transnational history connecting events in Germany with developments in New Guinea and Australia. The author explores the impact of political desires, national ambitions and missionary aspirations. Looking after One's Own shows a sophisticated appreciation of the distinction between principle and pragmatism and the ability of individuals to hold them both in suspension in their actions.
List of contents
Contents: German foreign missions and National Socialism - Transnational history connecting Germany, New Guinea and Australia - German colonialism - Australian colonialism - Weimar Republic - Racial theory and Anti-Semitism - Politics of the Neuendettelsauer Mission - League of Nations Mandate system - NSDAP organisations abroad - Oceania.
Report
«Drawing extensively on government and missionary archives in Germany and Australia, especially those in Neuendettelsau itself, Christine Winter has written a remarkably interesting and original account of a little known aspect of the history of Weimar and Nazi Germany, one that intersects in unexpected ways with the history of Australia and New Guinea as well.» (Stewart Firth, Australian Journal of Politics and History 59, 2013/3)
