An imperial homeland : forging German identity in Southwest Africa Introduction : national fantasies German identity and the African Heimat New worlds of vitality : colonial aspirations and the German nation 1848 1884 Between Heimat and heathens : religious chauvinism in southwest Africa A blessing to itself and the motherland : extolling empire in the age of imperial conquest I have done all I can : African resistance and the evolution of German colonial violence My nearly white wife : colonial citizenship and the racial boundaries of Germanness A little bit of the devil in his body : imperial masculinity and the ideal German (settler) Conclusion : after empire Heimat Südwest and German identity. Examines the relationship between imperial Germany and its empire in southwest Africa (present day Namibia) exploring how Africans confronted foreign rule and altered German national identity between 1842 and 1915