Daily Life in Nazi Germany:

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LIFE IN NAZI GERMANY PROJECT



        


Daily Life in Nazi Germany

 

             After assuming political power, Adolph Hitler decided to implement his mission of reviving German strength, acquiring territory for more living space or Lebensraum, and establishing a foundation of a pure racial state. In order to achieve his goals, Hitler needed to create a national community unified in mind, will, and spirit. (Volksgemeinschaft).

Volksgemeinschaft could only be attained through total state control; therefore, every area of cultural and social life had to be controlled to achieve Nazi ideals. Culture, the press, movies, and children’s activities were among the many aspects of daily life controlled by the Nazis.

           

In order to control information and propaganda, controls were placed on the entertainment and communications industries. Hitler authorized the establishment of the Reich Chamber of Culture and appointed Joseph Gobbles as Minister of Propaganda. The Reich Chamber of Culture consisted of seven divisions: music, theater, literature, radio broadcasting, the press, visual arts, and film. The Chamber of Culture was mainly only established to keep undesirables such as Jews and other minorities out.

           

 All German newspapers were brought under the control of the Eher Verlag, the Nazi publishing house where propaganda articles were pre-written for the newspapers to use. Buildings in Germany were meant to last a thousand years and were built to represent mediaeval themes. Film in Nazi Germany glorified the party, Adolph Hitler, and martyrdom for Nazism.

           

 In their desire to establish a total state, the Nazis understood the importance of “selling” their ideology to the youth. To accomplish this, Hitler established Nazi youth groups. Boys’ age ten to fourteen years old participated in the “Jungvolk”, and boys fourteen to eighteen years old participated in the “Hitler Jugend”. Both groups’ took up military values and virtues, such as duty, obedience, honor, courage, strength, and ruthlessness. Uniforms and regular military drills whould accompany ceremonies honoring the war dead. Most importantly, the Hitler Youth did their utmost to teach the youth of Germany the views of the Nazi party. Youth leaders developed in the youth of Germany a sense of patriotism and utter devotion to Adolph Hitler. By 1939, when membership in the Hitler Youth became compulsory, each new member of the Jungvolk was required to take an oath to the Fuhrer swearing total allegiance.

           

 Young girls were also a part of the Hitler Youth in Nazi Germany. Girls age ten to fourteen were members of the Jungmadel, while girls fourteen to eighteen belonged to the Bund Deutscher Madel. Hitler youth girls were taught obedience and discipline. Girls were taught to be dutiful wives and mothers.

Members of the Bund Deutscher Madel were educated in the skills needed for domestic chores, nursing, and hygiene.

         

   Daily life in Nazi Germany was manipulated from the beginning of Nazi rule. Propaganda dominated popular culture and entertainment. Finally, Hitler and the party realized the possibilities of controlling Germany’s youth as a means of continuing the Reich, and insuring total control over a future generation.

Women in Nazi Germany

In the  (NSDAP) programme of 25 points published in 1920 stated that it disapproved of women working.  claimed that the emancipation of women was a slogan invented by  intellectuals. He argued that for the German woman her "world is her husband, her family, her children, and her home."

The view that women should remain at home was reinforced when a third of male workers lost their jobs and became  during the depression in the 1930s. Nazis argued that men were being replaced by female workers who, on average, only received 66% of men's wages.

During the election campaign in 1932,  promised that if he gained power he would take 800,000 women out of employment within four years. In August 1933 a law was passed that enabled married couple to obtain loans to set up homes and start families. To pay for this single men and childless couples were taxed more heavily.

The decline in  after the Nazis gained power meant that it was not necessary to force women out of manual work. However, action was taken to reduce the number of women working in the professions. Married women doctors and civil servants were dismissed in 1934 and from June 1936 women could no longer act as judges or public prosecutors. Hitler's hostility to women was shown by his decision to make them ineligible to jury service because he believed them to be unable to "think logically or reason objectively, since they are ruled only by emotion." As such the decrease in unemployment was probably less then the figure state becouse many women were forced out of work.

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When  came to power in 1933 he appointed  as Reich Women's Leader and head of the Nazi Women's League. Scholtz-Klink's main task was to emphasize male superiority and the importance of child-bearing. In one speech she pointed out that "the mission of woman is to minister in the home and in her profession to the needs of life from the first to last moment of man's existence."

In July 1934 Scholtz-Klink was appointed as head of the Women's Bureau in the German Labour Front. She now had responsibility for persuading women to work for the good of the Nazi government. ...

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