Roadmap

Abstract

On February 22, 1962, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy spoke at the Berlin Wall. In his speech, Kennedy located Cold War Berlin as both an outpost and extension of the divided landscapes of American culture. He acknowledged the Berlin Wall in reference to hostile and entrenched racial divides within the United States, referring to the latter as “our wall.” Farber argues Kennedy’s statement can be read as part of a much larger cultural dialogue that had quickly started to unfold in the 1960s as American artists, writers, and activists began drawing attention to the connections between the Berlin Wall and barriers in U.S. democracy. The book traces the Berlin Wall as a site of pilgrimage for critical American cultural producers who confronted the contradictions of U.S. Cold War policy and practice while in Berlin. The introduction lays out Farber’s framework, methodology, and main figures in the book.