THE NOT-SO-GOLDEN TWENTIES - EVERYDAY LIFE AND COMMUNIST AGITPROP IN WEIMAR-ERA BERLIN

Proletarian youth. in Weimar-era Berlin used motifs and symbols from m ass culture and working-class culture to contruct intellectual and soc ial identities that would empower them against the almost total impote nce dictated by their objective economic situation. One means of self- empowerment was membership in the German Communist Party (KPD) or any of its ancillary organizations. Membership in the Party did not automa tically confer class consciousness, but rather was merely one of a num ber of roughly equivalent choices. By exploring agitprop troupes-playe rs of revolutionary communist theater-within their social milieu, this article demonstrates that youth could only understand Party concerns and dictates through the prism of their everyday experience.