“Picturing Deutschböhmen” explores German Bohemian efforts to convey the idea of a new nationally defined region in Late Habsburg Austria, ‘Deutschböhmen.’ It considers their use of relatively new...Show more“Picturing Deutschböhmen” explores German Bohemian efforts to convey the idea of a new nationally defined region in Late Habsburg Austria, ‘Deutschböhmen.’ It considers their use of relatively new technologies and modes of consumption to this end, primarily photography and mass tourism. Whereas parallel Czech and Hungarian claims to greater autonomy garnered a sense of legitimacy from historical precedents in the Kingdoms of Bohemia and Hungary, no similar examples could be cited by German nationalists in western Bohemia for their supposed region. Instead, German Bohemians relied on the culturally situated potency of the Heimat-genre as well as the documentary ‘realness’ of photographic images. Making use of specific tropes and vocabularies, both textual and visual, guidebooks and other tourist material encouraged outsiders, especially Germans elsewhere, to literally or figuratively visit and witness Deutschböhmen for themselves. Consequently, readers were introduced to an area that was distinct from the rest of Bohemia and an inherent part of the timeless territory of the German Heimat.Show less