ABSTRACT
My first contact with American culture was through an America House-these Amerika Häuser were built in post-World War II Germany as places for Germans to learn more about America, and for America to spread a positive message about the West. There I became acquainted with American literature and discovered German authors, such as Thomas Mann; it was then that I read Josef und seine
Brüder. I also heard real jazz music for the first time-considered “decadent” by the Nazis, it had been banned-which lead to my attempting to play it myself.
