About the meaning of our life
From the meaning of our life is a gift book, which was given to pupils of the GDR from 1983 until the reunification on the occasion of the youth consecration .
Structure and edition
The work was published by the Central Committee for Youth Consecration in the GDR from 1983 to 1989 in a total of seven editions and published by Neues Leben in Berlin . It replaced the book Socialism, Your World , published since 1975 . Up to the spring of 1989, 200,000 copies of the book were produced annually, making it the most printed book in the GDR. The 250-page, large-format work was richly furnished with color photographs, graphics and drawings for the conditions at the time. The entire production took place at VEB Interdruck Grafischer Großbetrieb Leipzig . The book was not available in stores.
The gift book should - like the previous books - be based on the educational goals of the SED and convey the image of the all-round developed personality and promote their development. In the last youth consecration book of the GDR, in contrast to earlier gift books, life-world-oriented topics were also taken up.
content
Foreword by the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany and Chairman of the State Council of the German Democratic Republic
In the foreword, Erich Honecker, in his capacity as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the SED and Chairman of the State Council, recalls the long tradition of the youth consecration as a celebration of the revolutionary working class . At the same time, the youth are obliged to actively shape the future together with the elderly and to work for the preservation of peace and socialism .
Chapter One: The Time We Live In
In the 6-page introductory chapter of the book, a multitude of rhetorical questions about the origin of life, the forms of society and the meaning of life are asked. At the center of the complex of questions are socio-political questions such as “Why is socialism the natural result of human history so far? What enables the working class to overthrow capitalism and establish socialism? ... What does society, the socialist fatherland expect from a young citizen, and how can he meet these demands? ”But questions about the meaning of life and happiness also arise raised. This is followed by a brief summary of the history of the working class and socialism in the 20th century. Then, from the authors' point of view, the advantages of the socialist social order compared to the capital or imperialist social system are presented several times .
Second chapter: Knowledge of nature and worldview
The 63-page chapter is preceded by a quote from Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel . The first part of the chapter is devoted to the formation and exploration of the universe , galaxies and stars . Finally, the question of extraterrestrial civilizations is taken up. Short biographies of Albert Einstein , Immanuel Kant , Galileo Galilei , Johannes Kepler , Nicolaus Copernicus , Isaac Newton and Juri Gagarin as well as some infographics complete the texts. The second part of the chapter deals with the formation, structure and change of the earth. Geological processes and Alfred Wegener's continental drift theory are presented in compact form. The chapter closes with the question “What is life?”. This part provides a brief outline of the human development and socialization history, which is supplemented by biographies by Charles Darwin , Johann Gregor Mendel , Alexander Oparin , Francis Bacon , Giordano Bruno and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.
Third Chapter: Who Is Driving History?
The 62-page third chapter is devoted to the fundamentals of dialectical and historical materialism as the basis for the “scientific worldview of the working class”. The historical stages of development of society as distinguished by Karl Marx are dealt with in detail, in particular the development of capitalist society and the transition to socialist and communist society. The " fundamental contradiction of the capital social order " formulated by Marx between the social character of production and the private capitalist appropriation of the social product is presented. The chapter also examines the question of why Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels developed into revolutionaries. The next part in this chapter "History knows no standstill" dealt with human evolution from the point of view of the Marxist-Leninist worldview . The short biographies of Plato , Spartacus , Leonardo da Vinci , Johann Gutenberg , Albrecht Dürer , Thomas Müntzer , Martin Luther and Thomas More supplemented the textual explanations. The next section characterizes “imperialism as dying capitalism” from a Lenin's perspective. Numerous examples of the aggressive, warmongering, "parasitic and putrid" character are given by the authors, the formation of financial oligarchies and state monopoly capitalism are described. The section is supplemented by short biographies by Hermann von Helmholtz , Julius Robert von Mayer and Robert Koch . The last section of the chapter is devoted to the development of socialism from the theoretical foundations to the historical development of the socialist states in the 20th century, starting with the Great October Socialist Revolution up to the national liberation movements in Central America and Africa of the 1980s.
Chapter Four: In the Struggle for Peace and Social Progress
The fourth chapter describes the development of the GDR and the historical roots of the German working class. The chapter is introduced with a quote from the SED program, which was held on the IX. The SED party congress in 1976 decided: “The Socialist Unity Party of Germany has set itself the goal of continuing to shape the developed socialist society in the German Democratic Republic and thus to create the basic conditions for the gradual transition to communism. “This part of the book deals with the continuation of the humanistic traditions in the GDR. Biographies of Erich Honecker and leaders of the German labor movement Karl Liebknecht , Rosa Luxemburg , Ernst Thälmann , Wilhelm Pieck , Otto Grotewohl , Walter Ulbricht , scientists such as Erich Correns , Georg Bilkenroth , Gustav Hertz , Heinrich Mauersberger , Theodor Brugsch as well as the namesake of activist movements Frida Hockauf and Adolf Hennecke complete the text together with infographics on the structure of the socialist state power in the GDR, on national income , housing construction and trade relations with the Soviet Union. Another focus of the chapter is placed on the tasks of national defense, its position in the Warsaw Treaty Organization and on the global peace movement in the early 1980s. The chapter ends with a brief outlook on the transition to a communist society and leads with the sentence “To create communism is in our hands” to the final chapter of the book.
Chapter Five: You and Socialism
The 50-page final chapter, which is intended to give the young people specific recommendations for their further development and a “guide to tomorrow and the day after tomorrow”, is preceded by a quote from Wilhelm Meister's years of wandering by Johann Wolfgang Goethe : “How can you get to know yourself? Never by looking, but by acting. Try to do your duty and you will know what is up to you. But what is your duty? The challenge of the day. ”The authors answer questions such as What does it mean to be a personality? and what do I want to achieve in my life? In particular, the role of people as a social individual and as a collective is emphasized. The book concludes with everyday topics such as the question of happiness and love "as human values" as well as recommendations on the most elementary rules of the "socialist behavioral culture" such as order, cleanliness, personal hygiene, courtesy, honesty and love of truth. The book closes with the saying of the Roman poet Horace : “ Carpe diem ! - Carpe Diem"!
literature
- Author collective: On the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. New Life Publishing House, Berlin 1985.
- Heike Acker: Marxist thinking in education. Inaugural dissertation from the Fernuniversität Hagen ( PDF file; 1.84 MB ).
Individual evidence
- ↑ Joachim Chowanski, Rolf Dreier: The youth consecration a cultural history since 1852. edition ost, Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-932180-56-9 , p. 111.
- ↑ Hartmut Zimmermann (ed.): GDR manual. Volume 1, ISBN 978-3-8046-8642-7 , pp. 693f.
- ^ Socialist Society and Education ( Memento of the original dated February 11, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. kas.de, accessed on December 16, 2013.
- ↑ Martin Hewner: The youth consecration in the GDR and in today's new federal states. University of Rostock, 2002, p. 13.
- ↑ Erich Honecker: Dear young friends! In: From the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1985, p. 5f.
- ↑ Collective of authors: From the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1985, p. 7.
- ↑ The first hidden and closed being of the universe has no power that could resist the courage of knowing; it must open to him and lay before his eyes its riches and depths and give them to enjoy.
- ↑ Collective of authors: From the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1985, p. 141.
- ↑ Collective of authors: From the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1985, p. 208.
- ↑ Kerstin Rönecke: Our compass in dying capitalism , Faz.net, July 28, 2013 , accessed on December 19, 2013.
- ↑ Collective of authors: From the meaning of our life. 3. Edition. Verlag Neues Leben, Berlin 1985, p. 246 ff.
