German life and civilization,

This volume contains the contributions to the Twenty-Ninth Wisconsin Workshop on "Concepts of Culture." Culture studies in the United States have arrived at a turning point. There is a clear orientation toward solidification on the one hand and to self-clarification on the other. Throughout the exciting debates at the Workshop it became clear that culture studies cannot be reduced to a quest for identity or an inconceivable "Other." It has also become clear, however, that declarations of the end of the "revolution," in order to do (new) business as usual, do not hit the mark either. In nine essays, German studies scholars help to show the state of the discipline and its problematic ambitions.

This volume collects the papers presented at a conference that took place in Berkeley, California, in October 1997 in honor of Heinrich Heine's two-hundredth birthday. The theme of that conference was Heine's identity, which was formed and reformed, revised and modified, in relationship to the politics, religion, and nationalism of his era. Several speakers focused on Heine's Jewish identity and most contributions touched on his relationship to the politics of his era. The resulting essays offer a more differentiated understanding of Heine's predicaments and choices, as well as the parameters placed on him by the exigencies of the time. What this volume therefore achieves is not a radically new vision of Heine, but one that recognizes the ambivalences and vacillations, as well as the development and consistency, of his complex identity.