This article explores the anxieties in German during the period of the Weimar Republic through an analysis on Weimar expressionist films. The Weimar Republic that was established in the early 20th century was affected by huge anxieties across the entire society.
These anxieties, of course, resulted from the born vulnerability of the republic’s political system and a series of political and economic disasters brought on by the First World War followed by their defeat in the war. But there was a deeper root, which was the loss of the sense of stability that began with the "end of the century".
In the Republic, social boundaries, such as race, class, and gender, previously believed to guarantees social order and hierarchy were being shifted. Therefore, research on the anxieties of the Weimar Republic needs pay attention to the atmosphere of late 19th Germany.
The anxieties of the Weimar Republic have been directly or indirectly reflected in various media. The most distinctive examples were found in films that were very popular at that time. Among them, expressionist films best visualized social anxieties. This was because expressionist films were focused on representing what was inside the human mind visually.
With an attention to this point, this article focuses on expressionist films. Fifteen films are used for analysis. Symbols and images of anxiety will be traced through the various elements of films such as narrative, story, shooting and editing techniques, use of lighting, and acting. Thye anxieties visualized in expressionist films can be divided into four categories: ‘fin-de-siecle’ anxiety, war anxiety, economic anxiety, and sexual anxiety.
At the end of the 19th century, the advancement of civilization brought about ‘fin-de-siecle’ anxiety. In the atmosphere of the Victorian era, there was a growing public concern about mental illness, especially anxiety, and the whole Europe was been caught up in rapid modernization. Germany was no different. This mood of the times is visualized as forces disrupting order and the emphasis on fate in expressionist films.
The experience of the First World War and memories of it gave rise to war anxiety. The war made it nearly impossible for people to believe in rationality and civilization, while human violence was given free reign. The unbridgeable gap between praise of the war at the beginning and the despair after the war, threw German intellectuals and artists into a panic. This situation has been represented in films as the Grim Reaper signifying death, "shell shock" as a reaction to the trauma of the war, and street violence.
Incessant economic crises which were the most direct cause of the instability of the Weimar Republic, led to economic anxiety. The economic stagnation and destitution that had neen a huge problem even before the birth of the Weimar Republic threatened the stability of the individual lives as well as the political system.
The "sexual liberation" of the Weimar Republic, the decline of sexual morality, and confusion of gender boundaries all reinforced sexual anxiety. The anxiety about society’s sexual decadence complaints about the rise of women as a competitors for jobs, resulted in the blame being cast women. Images of "promiscuous women" and their tragic ending in films shows the patriarchal constraints on women and their relegation to the home.
This study contributes to a better understanding of the anxieties of Weimar Republic and offers a new perspective on the interactions between media and emotions. Furthermore, it tries to extend the scope of historical studies of emotions by focusing on anxiety, a relatively unnoticed area in historical studies.