Identity and the German Volksseele

It was so much easier back during the Reich to determine who was a real German.  All one needed to do was produce an Ariernachweis as proof that one's blood was not tainted by foreign lineage.  Today it's more challenging because of the Grundgesetz and all.  But that hasn't stopped the right-wing "philosopher"  Caroline Sommerfeld from coming up with a typology of German identity.  First and foremost, according to Frau Sommerfeld - who feels more at home in the völkisch atmosphere of Austria - is the paramount importance of Ancestry ("Abstammung"):

"Deutschsein ist prima facie eine Frage der Abstammung. Alles weitere ist kontraintuitiv und daher begründungsbedürftig. „Deutsch ist, wer deutsche Eltern hat“, pflegt Götz Kubitschek zu sagen. Daß jemand auch aus anderen Gründen und auf anderen Ebenen Deutscher sein oder werden kann, setzt diesen Kern des Begriffs nicht außer Kraft."

But what about a person who doesn't have a German Ancestry?  Say, for example, a black African?  Can he or she ever be considered echt Deutsch ("genuine German)?

"Wenn wir einen einzelnen Schwarzafrikaner hernehmen, der nach Deutschland kommt, eine Deutsche heiratet, mit ihr Kinder bekommt und sich sukzessive mit der deutschen Volksseele verbindet, dann nähern sich seine Kinder und Kindeskinder ihrerseits schrittweise dem Abstammungsdeutschtum an und werden so auch leibliche Teile des Volkskörpers"

Okay, the operative word here is nähern (to approach, or get close to).  So a black African can "get close" to being German if his or her "African" genes are diluted over the generations through marrying a German. An then only if  he or she bonds with the deutsche Volksseele (" the soul of the German Volk").  Frau Sommerfeld doesn't explain exactly what the deutsche Volksseele actually is - , presumably some mystical concoction of Blut and Boden. 

In an earlier interview in Der Spiegel, Dr. Sommerfeld was much more explicit: a non-white can NEVER be considered German:

Auf die Frage, ob jemand, der nicht weiß ist, Deutscher sein könne, antwortet sie: "Nein!" Deutschsein sei zwar keine reine Rassenfrage. "Aber es hat auf jeden Fall ganz elementar eine ethnische Komponente. Mit der Staatsbürgerschaft allein ist es nicht getan."

Here in the United States things are a bit simpler: anyone from any race can become an American citizen, and this is generally accepted by all.  If there is such a thing as an amerikanische Volksseele, then it has to do with a fervent commitment to Liberty - although our Volksseele is tainted by the original sins of Slavery and Genocide of the indigenous peoples. 

That's not to say becoming an American was ever easy.  There has always been resistance to people of different color coming to our shores.  After all, it was Ben Franklin who complained  about the hordes of German with "swarthy complexion" over running the young nation (see Ben Franklin on "Stupid, Swarthy Germans").  But this prejudice didn't prevent millions of Germans from coming to American in pursuit of Liberty - including a draft dodger from Kallstadt named Frederick Trump. 

Comments

[Koogleschreiber]

The news today are reporting that the state of Washington has deemed the death sentence because it had been “imposed in an arbitrary and racially biased manner.”
Well, very good news, but does that also mean black people will have fairer trials in future or will they get life sentences instead in the same manner? In the U.S.A. a black person is much more likely to be poor and go to jail than a white American. Though this is a structural phenomenom of the American society, the amerikanische Volksseele is willingly accepting that as the flipside of its "fervent commitment to Liberty". Give me liberty, or give me death - is a quote of a slave owner. If Germany had death penalties imposed in an arbitrary and racially biased manner and structural racism and founding fathers who were slave owners, one might draw conclusions about the deutsche Volksseele just by picking out a single German right-wing philosopher - without being arrogant.

[David]

And yet Americans elected a black man as president - twice. A land full of contradictions and paradoxes.

The point was that "Volksseele" is a crock of sh*t - a throwback to Alfred Rosenberg.