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Podcast: New Books in German Studies
Episode: Anne Berg, "Empire of Rags and Bones: Waste and War in Nazi Germany" (Oxford UP, 2024)
Description: Paper, bottles, metal scrap, kitchen garbage, rubber, hair, fat, rags, and bones--the Nazi empire demanded its population obsessively collect anything that could be reused or recycled. Entrepreneurs, policy makers, and ordinary citizens conjured up countless schemes to squeeze value from waste or invent new purposes for defunct or spent material, no matter the cost to people or the environment. As World War II dragged on, rescued loot--much of it waste--clogged transport routes and piled up in warehouses across Europe.Historicizing the much-championed ideal of zero waste, Anne Berg shows that the management of waste was central to...