Following the tradition of discourse analysis, this article examines representations of two narratives of immigration in U.S. and German social studies textbooks: the ideas of the United States as a nation of immigrants and of Germany as a (non-)immigration country. Textbooks are of particular importance in this regard, as they contain one of the few quasi-official formulations of national selfunderstandings. Among the most crucial findings is that in Germany, the country's decade-old self-denial of its status as a country of immigration is no longer a tenable official position, but, at the same time, the conscious self-identification as an immigration country has not yet profoundly reshaped German national identity. In the United States, on the other hand, the clichéd self-designation as a 'nation of immigrants' has not lost its appeal as a rhetorical device and grand narrative of national history, but seems increasingly anachronistic with regard to the country's broader immigration discourse.
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