Institute of Historical and Cultural Anthropology

Bindestrich-Deutsche: Mehrfachzugehörigkeit und Beheimatungspraktiken im Alltag

(Hyphenated Germans? Multiple Belonging and Home-Making Practices in Everyday Life)

More and more people in Germany feel a sense of belonging both to Germany and to another country. The reasons are many: Some people have grown up in a binational family with parents from two different countries. Some have migrated to Germany from their country of origin, to which they still have attachments, or perhaps they were born in Germany but lived in another country for a substantial amount of time. Others were born in Germany but grew up with parents who were not. How does this kind of dual (or multiple) belonging affect everyday life? In which habits and everyday actions is it reflected? How do people practice their multiple sense of home?

The contributions to this volume follow 'hyphenated Germans' into areas of their lives in which they experience and live out their multiple belongingness. They offer windows onto their everyday lives which show that it can be enriching as well as challenging to combine multiple senses of belonging. They also show that a sense of belonging is closely intertwined with quotidian activities such as conversing, eating, and dressing – and that they can vary according to the situation: Where and when does one feel like a 'hyphenated German' - if ever at all?

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