ABSTRACT
A chapter on the social will now complete1 the tripartite unity of my discussion on West German national identity constructions in fi lms of the NGC. I am arguing that, besides its specifi c senses of place and time, a national way of ‘being in the world’ also, or even most importantly, has a social dimension. More precisely, the analysis of place-related issues, along with the narrative/temporal function of protagonists such as the hunter/poacher and other (anti-)heroes and heroines in anti-Heimat fi lms as well as the perpetrator, the victim, the ‘normal’ person, and further characters in past, present, and future narratives, proved largely inseparable from an investigation of their social roles-even though these earlier studies were consciously set out as confi ned to the examination of national identity constructions which could be seen as primarily associated with place and the temporal realm.
