Transnational Subjects Challenging European Notions of Subjectivity and National Identity: Erpenbeck’s Alternative Narrative

Building on the theoretical framework Elisabeth Herrmann, Carrie Smith-Prei, and Stuart Taberner establish in Transnationalism in Contemporary German-Language Literature (2015), I analyze Jenny Erpenbeck’s Gehen Ging Gegangen (2015) as an example for transnational literature that demonstrates how national rhetoric and geographical borders, despite their permeability as evidenced in increasing mobility and migration flows, continue to be forceful concepts that influence the life of migrants.  Richard, a professor emeritus who meets African asylum seekers in Berlin, decides to no longer talk about these individuals, but to actually engage with them to get answers for his research questions. Consequently, he finds himself challenged on a variety of levels, not least regarding questions of his own identity. I read Erpenbeck’s novel with a focus on the ways in which Germans deal with the flows of people, products, and ideas across borders, and how transnational subjects question and transform German and European notions of subjectivity, nation, and national identity. Based on the notion that affect is key to understanding the present and the political, my paper reveals that in Gehen Ging Gegangen, national affiliation emerges as relevant insofar as nation describes a community whose identity is based on a common history and horizon of experience. The novel, transcends this experiential, mental, cultural, and intellectual horizon by exhibiting a new collective life experience. Transnationalism emerges not as an alternative to national narratives, but a significant marker of the present and a methodological approach that stresses a critique of nationalism and its mythologies.