Jazz, Rock and Rebels : Cold War Politics and American Culture in a Divided Germany

In the two decades after World War II, Germans on both sides of the iron curtain argued vehemently over American cultural imports, This text traces how westerns, jeans, jazz and rock and roll, and stars like Marlon Brando and Elvis Presley reached adolescents in both Germanies.

It emphasizes that East and West German authorities deployed gender and racial norms to contain Americanized youth cultures in their own territories and to fight the Cold War battle between the two states.