The myth of scientific neutrality – educational films in schools during the Cold War

The aim was to train 'socialist personalities' who were assertive, fact-oriented and committed to the collective. To this end, educational research in the GDR attempted to further develop and utilise film as an educational tool based on efficiency considerations. The educational films were not only part of a specific audiovisual culture and a repository of intentionally shaped knowledge content and teaching practices but were also integrated into processes of historical change in media and technology. The project analysed the factual content and forms of visualisation updated in film, as well as contemporary modes of reception. It identified the institutions of educational and instructional films in the GDR and examined research into the use and effectiveness of teaching materials in the GDR.

Research into educational films in the GDR was divided into the areas of schools, teacher training and continuing education, and universities. As part of a lively, state-commissioned research effort into the effectiveness of teaching and learning materials, several studies were carried out with lesson observations and questionnaire evaluations on both didactic use and learning success in schools and universities. The results of these studies were incorporated into handbooks, manuals, and unpublished dissertations. The analysis of documents from these diverse writings made it possible to identify the design principles of film production and practices of film use in the GDR from a media-historical perspective.

Sequential film analyses of GDR educational films also provided information about the use of specific design tools. The focus was on scientific narratives and their ideological connotations. For the project, a partial inventory of 16mm films from the former Weimar School Film Archive (Weimarer Schulfilmarchiv) was digitised. However, the key finding is that the entire inventory of educational films produced in the GDR cannot currently be accessed, as no filmography is available to date and the film inventory at the Federal Archives (Deutsches Bundesarchiv) can only be researched to a limited extent. For the project work, the film titles that were listed between 1950 and 1990 within the subjects of chemistry, biology and physics were identified from GDR teaching material catalogues. These catalogues are accessible via the Research Library for the History of Education at DIPF (Bibliothek für Bildungsgeschichtliche Forschung). The data obtained in this way was compared with that of existing film databases and supplemented with project-relevant metadata – this process is not yet complete.

Even though GDR educational film theory texts emphasised the motivational power of these audiovisual media, there has been little evidence to date of how students responded to the films. In the second phase of the project, the study turns its attention to the students. It also examines the role that the supposed requirements of a scientific-technical revolution played in educational films that became relevant for the GDR's education policy measures from the 1970s onwards.