GermanGerman CultureCulture NewsNews Cornell University Institute for German Cultural Studies Spring 2006 Vol. XIV No. II In This Issue: Conferences Conservative Thought in West Germany Conservative Thought in West Germany

Graduate Student After 1940: Conference: Pop

Colloquium Series Martin Heidegger Carl Schmitt Ernst Jünger Epic, Document, and the Verbal World Picture Our question here, which I think defines not only Peter and me, but many of the speakers at this conference as belonging to one and the same gen- Klezmerizing the Holocaust eration, is simply this: What do we know about Heidegger’s, Jünger’s, and Schmitt’s thought before, during, and after the Second World War? What did Theatre Scandals as they think about the crimes of the Nazi regime? How did they judge their Cultural Dreamwork own political past? And how did they cope with both the occupation after Robert Walser’s ’45, and the new political realities in Germany under the conditions of the Digressive Tactics and Cold War? These questions seem all the more important as Heidegger’s, the Narrativity of Antin- arrative Jünger’s, and Schmitt’s thought keeps haunting us at a time of new global conflicts and wars. Schiller im Streit und —Wolf Kittler Widerstreit Constantin Goschler of German “success story” cism of the “licensed public Ottomar Domnick’s the Ruhr-University Bo- referred to as the “Umkehr,” sphere,” and their refusal ‘Other’ Cinema of the Adenauer Era chum opened the confer- in which liberalism seemed to fill out the denazification ence with his talk entitled to rise from the ashes of the questionnaire. Goschler Also “Intellectual Constellations Third Reich. In what Gos- then explored German Recent Dissertations in the Early Federal Re- chler referred to as a “dou- conservative thought in the public.” Goschler proposed ble-faced discourse,” these ensuing decades. In conclu- Neighbors and other to answer two main ques- three thinkers assembled ad- sion, he directed attention Creatures tions: In what manner did herents of their self-cultivat- away from the idea of these conservative intellectuals ed elitist positions in closed three thinkers as keys to the adapt to post-war Germany, circles, even while publicly “dirty little secrets” of Ger- German Culture News and how and to what extent adapting to the new political man conservative thought, Cornell University IGCS did they shape the intel- atmosphere. However, after suggesting that one study 726 University Avenue Ithaca, NY 14850 lectual constellation of the German military defeat and them with the aim of better Federal Republic? Focusing in the political climate of understanding intellectual phone: 607/255-8408 on Heidegger, Schmitt, and the “Umkehr,” they owed constellations in Germany email: [email protected] Jünger’s attitudes towards much of their influence to and in the world today. liberalism, political science, their attitude of dissidence. Michael Geyer of the Peter U. Hohendahl, Director German guilt after the Holo- Goschler recalled Schmitt University of Chicago gave Robin Fostel, Editor & Designer caust, and Jews in Germany, and Jünger’s criticism of a talk entitled “Humanity Tim Haupt, Photographer & Goschler sought to locate Karl Jaspers’s willingness in an Age of Total Destruc- Graduate Student Coordinator these three thinkers in the to accept German guilt after tion: Jünger and Jünger, Casey Servais, Copy Editor framework of the post-1945 1945, their caustic criti- Heidegger and Arendt, Born within the time span of only one decade, between 1885 and 1895, Heidegger, Schmitt, and Jünger belong to a generation of intellectuals whose work is fundamentally marked by the experience of the First World War, the revolutions that followed in its wake, and the politi- cal situation of the first republic on German soil in the 1920s. Jünger, the decorated war hero, established a reputation as an acclaimed author, based on his experiences in the trenches of the first technological war in history. Schmitt, the scholar of jurisprudence, started his career with fierce attacks on the legal status of the Weimar Republic constitution. And Heidegger, the thinker, included in his book, Being and Time, a clear reference to the infantry tactics of the German offensive in the spring of 1918, “running-forward-into-death”.

All three had ties to the National-Socialist movement, and each of them had to bear the con- sequences of this political choice after the German defeat in 1945. Jünger was offered a po- sition as head of the Nazi Writer’s Union, but refused. His novel On the Marble Cliffs has been read as an—albeit veiled and ambivalent—attack on the Nazi regime. Like many Germans, both Schmitt and Heidegger joined the party on May 1, 1933, after the so called Enabling Act, which abolished the democratic nature of the state. Although they both withdrew from politics after growing tensions with the party, they never univocally distanced themselves from their involvement with the National Socialist movement. After 1945, Jünger was banned briefly from publishing, but was quickly rehabilitated. Schmitt was captured by the Americans, spending a year in an internment camp, but returned to the typical life of a private scholar. Heidegger lost his venia legendi, the right to lecture, but the decision was rescinded in 1951.

All three thinkers had a wide following after World War Two. When Jünger died in 1998, at age 102, he was a celebrated author, decorated by Helmut Kohl with the Bundesverdienstkreuz. Schmitt’s students had a decisive influence not only on the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany, but also (through his student Leo Strauss) on legal theory in the U.S.—some have argued not only in the lofty realm of theory, but also in the very politics of the current Bush ad- ministration, in its claim, for instance, that the President is not bound by the Constitution in times of war. Heidegger, finally, looms large in the Humanities because of the imprint of his work on the writings of such authors as Foucault and Derrida. —Wolf Kittler Schmitt and Anders on human capability to anni- inherent in the metalinguis- Jünger’s total mobilization Omnicide.” Geyer first hilate and the desire to do tics of analytic philosophy against an old world order launched an extensive dis- so. He concluded that the (which for Heidegger was is connected to the end of cussion of Friedrich Georg conservatives’ challenge not at all distinct from the metaphysics; it is in fact the Jünger’s book Perfektion of accounting for this gap formulaic thought of rock- last stage of the forgetting der Technik, written before between technology and etry). Such a technological of Being. Heidegger saw World War II but not pub- political judgment remained understanding of language communism and fascism lished until after it. In this unmet. —G.G. did, however, stand in op- as lining up to destroy the text, Jünger rejects an un- Saturday afternoon’s position to the movement world and criticized Jünger critical acceptance of tech- talks commenced with homeward. Jäger concluded not only for his exaggerated nology, describing technol- Christian Jäger (Humboldt his remarks on Heidegger’s pathos, but, more signifi- ogy as “rapacious” and as University), whose paper geopolitical turn by com- cantly, for his participation a “violent act of consump- was entitled “Adjusting menting that the turn con- in this destructive process. tion.” According to Jünger, (to) the Federal Republic: stitutes a merely apparent In keeping with this view, this rapacious progress of The Geopolitical Turn in shift: Throughout the devel- Heidegger found Der Arbe- technology follows the Heidegger’s Aesthetics opments described, Hei- iter to be an exceptionally law of entropy: The more after 1945.” In the years degger’s thought retained accurate description of con- advanced the technology, leading up to World War the same basic structural temporary history, although the greater the destruction II, Heidegger discussed elements, a fact that raises he also found that it offered it allows, setting in motion the role of the poet as that important questions about little or nothing other than “an unbounded calculus of a demigod who set the the nature of the post-war this mere description of the of destruction.” Ever more borders of the “Heimat” as Federal Republic in which surface of events. Jünger’s total war negates the idea a “Führer.” In this respect, this thought fit just as well participation in history of war gains, promotes a poets were like rivers in that as it had in the climate of constituted not so much a constant sense of insecurity, they demarcated a “Leben- pre-war Germany. moment of mastery and cre- and thus induces states of sraum” as a space for Being Wolf Kittler (Cornell ation as a form of enslave- fevered action unaccompa- and thereby participated in University), in his talk ment. Indeed, Heidegger’s nied by thought. the creation of a dwelling. entitled “From Gestalt to “Question Concerning Geyer then drew at- This view altered as the Gestell: Martin Heidegger Technology” can be read as tention to the parallels disappointed philosopher reads Ernst Jünger,” dis- an attempt to overcome the between Jünger’s text and turned away from National cussed the possibility of notion of the worker as an Heidegger’s “Die Frage Socialism and commented reinterpreting Heidegger’s agent of modern technol- nach der Technik,” in on an altered state of affairs later work in light of the ogy. In contrast to such a which Heidegger famously in which the poet has lost newly published volume conception, Heidegger’s equates mechanized agri- his prophetic function and in his collected works that proposes his own notion of culture with the destruction is no longer understood at consists of his notes on the man as a guardian of Being. of human life in the Nazi all. In this scheme, there writings of Ernst Jünger. —T.H. death camps. Geyer raised arises a need for the poet Kittler began by point- In his talk on “Con- Hannah Arendt’s objection to return home. This move- ing out that Heidegger’s serving Esotericism, or, to Jünger and Heidegger’s ment homeward, in turn, “Question Concerning Justifying the High Hand reasoning, namely that their requires developing a sense Technology,” Jünger’s Der of Violence,” Geoff Waite arguments lacked what St. of home, which occurs by Arbeiter, and Benjamin’s approached Heidegger and Augustine called “caritas:” thinking poetically. Accord- “The Work of Art in the Schmitt by looking closely love for human beings and ingly, Heidegger attempted Age of Mechanical Repro- at the How of their pub- appreciation of human to rescue poetic language as duction” share a remarkable lic, or “exoteric,” saying bonds. This, Geyer argued, a last refuge for the people, conceptual interrelatedness. and writing. Only in this helped explain why Ger- a move Jäger characterized More concretely, as far as way, Waite insisted, can man conservative thought as a form of reterritorializa- Heidegger’s later work is we hope to reach anything regarding technology erred tion. Language, in Hei- concerned, Der Arbeiter resembling the What—the in the context of the Cold degger’s view, was coming represents a junction of esoteric content, that which War, which illustrated a under attack by the effects the thought of Lenin and is not said—of their pro- persistent gap between the of technology, such as those Nietzsche. In this regard, nouncements. Erhard Schütz (German Literature, Humboldt University) regard, the figure of the during his presentation, Waldgänge—Before 1945 and After forest walker can be con- sidered as a parable for one words: “The ‘doctrine’ of a of the great Gestalten of thinker is what is unsaid in modernity. That is, insofar his saying.” as the forest can also be Waite ended his talk thought of as a metaphor by turning to a recently for urban existence, the published handwritten text modern subject is found to found in Heidegger’s liter- be isolated and abandoned ary remains called “Meine to the destruction and the Beseitigung.” Waite reads desert that surrounds him/ the text’s final reflections her. Nonetheless, walking on silence and the neces- the forest is not a retreat sity of “‘existing’ without into the interiority of the engagement” as a reminder subject. Rather, the forest that it is “all the more functions as a metaphor for necessary” to engage with political space; it is a public Heidegger and conserva- privation. So, too, the re- tive thought, but also, he treat into the forest belongs stresses, with capitalism. to the activity of an author. For all he has been saying, One withdraws into the Waite began by remark- thing in terms of the larger Waite concludes, is fior forest in order to be able ing that “conservative” capitalist economy and its dóibh, an Irish phrase that to write at all. Even as the is not the word he would superstructure. The ques- he translates “It is true for forest threatens or promises have chosen to describe tion, then, comes down not them [only because] they isolation, though, walking any one of the triumvirate to the What of fascism as have the power [for Time the forest is a movement to of German thinkers whose a symptom of capitalism, Being].” —S.F. a relief headquarters. That “conservatism” the confer- as Slavoj Žižek puts it, but Erhard Schütz (Hum- is, the forest insures free- ence set out to explore. to the How of this funda- boldt University) opened dom and a clear head for Waite instead appropriates mental connection: namely, the second day of the the forest walker. the word to speak of the “How is fascism coincident conference with his talk Marcus Bullock (Uni- conservation of the practice not just with capitalism but “Waldgänge—Before 1945 versity of Wisconsin – Mil- of esotericism. As thinkers also with esotericism and and After,” which discussed waukee) followed with his who used silence to articu- its conservation?” the various aspects and talk entitled “A Dialectician late (themselves, the What), Heidegger and Schmitt, implications of the figure of of Treason: Ernst Jünger and as thinkers engaged in the answer begins, did not the forest walker (Waldgän- between Ethos and Po- the “authentically philo- just damn any possible ger) and of the action of lis.” Bullock focused on sophical (and authentically alternative to capitalism by walking the forest in the questioning the status of Greek) conservation of eso- never once even mention- thought of Ernst Jünger. Jünger’s legacy by criti- tericism,” neither Schmitt ing such a possibility, by Schütz first explained that cally engaging the history nor Heidegger (Jünger is excluding such an alterna- for Jünger the forest walker of Jünger reception. Some left aside) could acknowl- tive from their discourse; cannot be half-hearted but facets of Jünger’s works edge “1945” as “anything they left us with no real is, rather, a solitary he- are undeniable: One cannot like an authentic event.” discourse at all—only si- roic figure. Given Jünger’s deny the existence of a cel- (The war’s end was merely lence. The real doctrines of experiences of the forest ebration of military heroism a military defeat, seen as their thought (though Waite during war, it became deter- as well as clear connections a “liberal or conservative makes clear that Heidegger, mined as a site of brutal- to fascism. Nevertheless, phantasm.”) Aside from not Schmitt, was the con- ity. Walking amidst this by relating the story of a shift in the balance of summate practitioner of brutality thrust a profound Jünger’s son, who was pun- global power, 1945 did not esotericism) needed to be loneliness and isolation on ished for critical remarks ultimately change any- left unsaid. In Heidegger’s the forest walker. In this concerning Hitler, Bullock implied that Jünger himself Carl Schmitt and Ernst Schmitt’s view of World Schmitt’s 1963 Theorie must have encouraged and Jünger’s evolving views on War II as a war that had des Partisanen, Hohen- participated in such critical geopolitics. Both Schmitt “gotten out of hand;” his dahl argued, can be read conversations within the and Jünger, Hohendahl reflections during and after as a kind of rejoinder to home. Given this scenario, indicated, abandoned their the war, however, focused Jünger’s (in Schmitt’s the legacy of Jünger is far earlier orientation towards on imagining the nature of view) utopian schemes. In too complicated to map the nation-state as the basic a desirable peace. Starting this text, Schmitt pointed to simply onto the Left/Right political unit—Schmitt by with his 1943 essay “Der the increasing significance axis common to political developing the concept of Friede,” Jünger suggested of irregular and guerilla discourse. By citing Fou- the Großraum, and Jünger that peace could only be wars as evidence of an cault, Bullock argued that by insisting on the neces- achieved by overcoming ongoing “global civil war” any such placement would sity of a world state. These the obsolete framework of that needed to be contained. tend to serve the purposes changes in both men’s the nation-state. Unfortu- Because Schmitt saw the of the person reviewing thought, Hohendahl argued, nately, most of Jünger’s revolutionary movements Jünger’s work and not arose out of their observa- suggestions for how the of his day primarily as contribute to honest schol- tions of changes in the way postwar world could be threats to order, and hence arship. Furthermore, Jünger wars were fought. peacefully organized re- as something to be ruthless- extricated himself from be- Hohendahl’s analysis of main on the level of poetic ly supressed (as was done ing placed on a Left/Right Schmitt initially focused discourse, offering little in by the French in Algeria), axis in that he questioned on the texts Land und Meer the way of realistic analysis he did not consider the pos- the division of the polity and Der Nomos der Erde, or concrete solutions. sibility that the success of into parties for the purposes both conceived and written of exercising power. Ac- in the 1940s. In these texts, cording to Jünger, it was Schmitt necessary to preserve the gives an Marcus Bullock (English, University of Wisconsin – body politic as a unit. So, account of Milwaukee), responds to questions after his presentation, A too, Jünger defined himself the break- Dialectician of Treason: Ernst Jünger between Ethos and Polis very broadly and rarely in down of univocal fashion. Focusing the system rather on the “Ich” as an of European international evolving and inconsistent law, a breakdown that leads entity, he left himself open to the disappearance of to easy misreadings. Such traditional legal constraints is the case with some con- on the conduct of war and servative interpretations of makes possible the modern Jünger that seek to reduce “war of extermination” his texts to a single dimen- (Vernichtungskrieg). Symp- sion. In order to counter tomatically, Schmitt does such one-sided appropria- not attribute any responsi- tions, Bullock suggested, bility for this development we must suspend and to the practices of the Ger- reconsider the conceptual man Wehrmacht or to Nazi apparatus with which we Germany’s own conduct approach the texts of Ernst of a war of extermination, Jünger. —T.H. instead accounting for the In a paper entitled breakdown of the traditional “Reflections on War and European laws of war solely Peace after 1940,” confer- in terms of the intrusion ence co-organizer Peter of “non-European” actors, Uwe Hohendahl (German especially the United States. Studies) offered a detailed Ernst Jünger, accord- comparative analysis of ing to Hohendahl, shared these revolutionary move- the manner in which many he moved to an analysis of to words to challenge her ments might itself be the recent legal positions ad- the Bush administration’s listeners’ preconceptions precondition for “order,” or opted by the Bush adminis- famous “torture memos,” about the meaning of 9/11, even for peace. tration reproduce positions showing how their reasoning juxtaposing faces and pic- In his paper “Carl developed by Carl Schmitt. mirrored that of Schmitt and tures we would not usually Schmitt and the Road to Like the administration, hence was susceptible to the have connected with one Abu Ghraib,” which has Schmitt aggressively argues same critiques. —C.S. another. Her presentation since appeared in the that “irregular combatants” Professor Susan Buck- opened with a screenshot journal Constellations, are undeserving of, or in- Morss closed the confer- of CNN coverage of the William E. Scheuerman capable of receiving, legal ence with a presentation collapse of the World Trade (Political Science and Law, protections. Irregular com- entitled “C. Schmitt, W. Center, which was immedi- Indiana University) applied batants are, for Schmitt, Benjamin, and G. W. Bush: ately followed by the title Carl Schmitt’s 1963 book necessarily consigned to a A Tragic Drama.” In her page of Hobbes’s Levia- Theorie des Partisanen to legal black hole—which is presentation, Professor than. Timothy McVeigh’s an analysis of contempo- where the Bush administra- Buck-Morss drew on Carl photo preceded that of rary US foreign policy. This tion has sought to put them. Schmitt’s 1950 book Der Mohammed Atta, and the book by Schmitt, Scheuer- Reconstructing the three Nomos der Erde to chal- audience was challenged to man argued, is “disturbing- main arguments Schmitt lenge the dominant rhetoric contemplate their similari- ly relevant to the political presents for his view—first, surrounding the events ties and differences as the and legal world in which that “authentic” politics of September 11, 2001, culprits of terrorist attacks. we now find ourselves, in necessarily elides legal stating that the attacks of Carl Schmitt re-appeared which the US government regulation, second, that that day were not attacks when the audience was has responded to 9/11 by irregular fighters don’t fit on America or American shown his photo alongside placing accused terrorists into a system of interna- society, but rather on the that of Karl Marx to demon- outside the Geneva Con- tional law based on nation- nomos of American power. strate differing understand- vention’s category of ‘legal states, and third, that the The attacks were shocking ings of the phenomenon of combatants’ and outfitting rapid rate of technological not because a state attacked the state, with Marx’s un- the executive with a stun- innovation characteristic another state, but because derstanding of the state as ning array of discretionary of modern warfare renders a group attacked the very an epiphenomenon contrast- powers to determine their legal regulations obsolete— concept of the state. ing with Schmitt’s belief in fate.” More specifically, Scheuerman countered each Professor Buck-Morss its necessity. Buck-Morss’s Scheuerman demonstrated of them in turn. From here, used images in addition final discussion centered around the viability of the nation-state as we under- stand it today when faced with the challenge of a non- state-based political unit. Is the nomos of the Earth in a state of flux? Buck- Morss offered no concrete answers, but did paint a troubled picture of the Unit- ed States’ eroding power to establish legitimacy for its actions—moral, economic, and political—around the globe. —D.L.

Grace Gemmell, Tim Haupt, Sam Frederick, Casey Servais, & David Michael Geyer (History, Low are graduate stu- University of Chicago) center dents in German Studies. Can the EU Survive? The New Germany & the Future of Europe On April 21, a debate took place between Andrew over the US invasion of Iraq serve as an example. Fi- Moravcsik (Director of Politics and EU Program, nally, the EU member states all currently suffer an Princeton University) and Jeremy Rabkin (Govern- unacceptable level of domestic instability rooted in the ment, Cornell University) on the topic “Can the EU problem of Muslim segments of the population being survive? The New Germany and the Future of Europe.” poorly integrated into the rest of society. Whereas Eu- Organizer Hubert Zimmermann (Government, Cornell rope appeared quite stable in a peaceful and prosperous University) opened the event by outlining the situation world, a somewhat grimmer outlook looms on Europe’s that prompted this question. Given the recent expansion horizon for the imminent future. of the EU and the possibility for the integration of more Andrew Moravcsik offered a more optimistic view of new member states of diverse and sometimes conflicting the future of the EU, affirming that the EU is a mature histories, what will the future function of the EU be, and polity that is here to stay. According to Moravcsik, con- will it be able to sustain itself as an institution given the stitutional systems must reach a certain level of stability radical diversity of new and potential members? in order to maintain unity while allowing for dissention Jeremy Rabkin began by defining the EU not as a among their members; the EU has reached this level. It is trade organization but as an organization with substantial in fact the most successful example of voluntary inter- influence on the international scene. Rabkin’s skepticism national cooperation in history, which offers an explana- that the EU will survive was based on its lack of features tion as to why the organization is continually attracting that he, as an American, assumes to be requisite for a new members. Moravcsik argued that Europe will be nation-state, namely, an army an executive, and a sys- able to play its international role effectively regardless of tem to enforce law. Given that the EU has none of these the fact that it has no army, because the most successful features, Rabkin argued that it is merely a cooperative form of foreign policy is influence by means of eco- organization of different states, and there has been no nomic activity and not by military invasion or coercion. historical example since the eighteenth Moravcsik concluded his discussion by century of such an organization suc- considering the reasons for which the cessfully maintaining its existence EU constitution was not ratified in across time. Rabkin also pointed out 2004. Given that the EU doesn’t col- that Europe has a long tradition lect or spend tax revenue, the of allowing institutions majority of voters have of minimal necessity to difficulty recognizing the linger on long past any use institution’s significance for that they might meaningfully their lives. In this regard, have served. He offered the the EU needs a new monarchy as a prime ideology based on its example. Further, the decentralized form of EU faces three chal- governance, which can lenges that it will not be then appeal to local able to overcome. political discourse and The first is an economic thereby gain support challenge: Once prosper- from the diverse groups ous European countries have, that must vote on its consti- for the past decade, suffered tution. a stagnant economy. Second, the EU member states have been unable to reach any unity in relation to questions Tim Haupt is a graduate of security, for which their divisions student in German Studies. Schmittian Traces in Žižek’s Account of Christianity (& some Derridean Specters) On February 27, Erik proceeds by condensing account, is fully aware that “Judaism” recapitulates Vogt, Associate Profes- “the specters of liberal- his embrace of Schmitt’s implicitly anti-Semitic sor of Philosophy at Trin- ism, communitarianism, decisionism may lead to elements of the Hegelian ity College, presented a multiculturalist politics, the charge of Linksfaschis- philosophy of history and lecture entitled “Schmittian identity politics, decon- mus from those Žižek calls Schmittian political theol- Traces in Žižek’s Account struction, postmodern “bleeding-heart liberals,” ogy on which it draws. of Christianity (and some dispersionism,” and “risk to which Žižek responds: Žižek, for instance, tends Derridean Specters).” Vogt theory” into the “concrete “so be it.” to identify what he calls framed his discussion of figure of the enemy.” All of Along with Schmitt’s the “dangerous residue of the treatment of Chris- these “spectral” ideologies, political theory, Vogt liberal-democratic, abstract tianity in Slavoj Žižek’s which collectively consti- argued, Žižek adopts universalism” with “Juda- recent work (The Fragile tute the anti-political “en- elements of his politi- ism,” “Jewish religion,” Absolute: Or, Why is the emy” of Žižek’s effort to cal theology. In his essay and “Jewish thought.” Christian Legacy Worth revive the political, fail to “Carl Schmitt in the Age of “Judaism,” for Žižek, is Fighting For?; On Belief; recognize the necessity of Post-Politics,” for instance, associated with liberal no- and The Puppet and the an absolute decision based, Žižek “forcefully formu- tions of the rule of law (or, Dwarf: The Perverse Core ultimately, on illusion, or lates the decisive task of in Jacques Lacan’s terms, of Christianity) in terms rather blind faith. As in preserving the Christian Law), whereas “Christi- of Žižek’s larger proj- Schmitt’s original Concept faith” as a supplement anity” is valorized as the ect—heavily influenced by of the Political, Žižek em- to Marxism. Abandon- overcoming of such no- the political philosopher phasizes that the revival of ing Marx’s own scientific tions in the lawless state Carl Schmitt—of overcom- the political necessarily en- methods in favor of a kind of exception. On Vogt’s ing the “foreclosure of tails the “real possibility of of decisionist neo-Lenin- account, the “new com- the political” in the con- physical, violent wagers” ism, Žižek presents Marx- munity” to which Žižek temporary world through and accordingly advocates ism, like Christianity, as aspires is one ruled by a mobilization of “proper “undermining the compla- being founded on uncon- Christian “love” rather political hatred directed at cency of our daily routine ditional faith. Vogt went than Jewish “law,” “love” the common political en- by introducing meaning- on to insinuate that Žižek’s for Žižek being defined as emy.” According to Vogt, less sacrifice and destruc- account of the relationship “authentic revolutionary Žižek’s Schmittian project tion.” Žižek, on Vogt’s between “Christianity” and violence” or as “the violent gesture of discarding, of establishing a difference, Slavo Žižek courtesy of zeitgeist films or drawing a line of separa- tion.” Far from embracing the anarchic tendencies of early Christianity, Žižek, according to Vogt, affirms Christianity “in its properly dogmatic and institutional aspect.” This valorization of the “Church as Army,” Vogt seemed to imply, held the danger of evolving into “a politicized claim of self- legitimation holding the potential of fanaticism.” Professor Vogt conclud- ed his lecture by outlining some elements of a possi- ble critique of Žižek based on the work of Jacques Derrida and Hent de Vries. Alle reden von Pop.

Wir Auch.

Amusement total...Sans regret?! New and Erratic Inquiries into the Nature of Pop

“The only reasonable way to talk about Pop is to point, captivated, at the captivating, hey, super.” So claims Rainald Goetz with apodictic aplomb in his 1986 essay collection “Hirn.” What if this statement were literally true—this claim that the mode of blissful affirmation is the only appropriate register of speech regarding all matters Pop? Should we despair because there is no room for an analytical position—inside or outside of Pop? Or should we simply be content to celebrate that Pop is the most beautiful thing on earth?

But what if Pop were only graffiti on a prison wall, as Dick Hebdidge famously insinuated? How could we verbalize such a notion? It seems as if we still lack the language necessary to vivisect Pop, as if to analyze Pop would mean killing its essence. The purpose of this confer- ence is to explore ways to overcome the position of ecstatic incommunicability that Goetz seems to postulate—but without falling prey to dry theoretical reductionism either.

The concept of Pop has been pervasive throughout the 20th century and into the 21st— nonetheless all attempts at giving a concise definition of the term have been surprisingly fu- tile. That might be because Pop knows no article—there is no such thing as “a” Pop or “the” Pop—and, consequently, we shouldn’t waste our time trying to invent what doesn’t exist. Instead we should play with the word, apply it, probe its promise and limitations. —Jens Schellhammer Mix I boredom is produced and Keynote Address Dr. Schumacher ob- Nathaniel Hansen of the then questions whether Eckhard Schumacher served that “Be Here Now” University of Chicago it is possible to perceive (Ludwig-Maximilians-Uni- can “mean virtually any- opened the Pop confer- that space/time without its versität München), author thing, but intends to mean ence with his paper “Haute being transformed by our of the book Gerade eben absolutely everything.” Banal: Introducing a New act of perception. Here, his jetzt: Schreibweisen der The nature of pop culture Aesthetic Concept for the discussion turned to the Gegenwart (Suhrkamp or pop phenomena is that Everyday.” Having en- lyrics of the Talking Heads, 2003), offered the confer- they occupy an undefined countered the term “haute which illustrate the ubiquity ence’s keynote address. Dr. moment, immediate and al- banal” in the writings and banality of the every- Schumacher oriented his ways passing into the past. of Dave Eggers, Hansen day. Hansen concentrated thoughts on pop culture However, through their sought to clarify the usage on three songs: “Don’t temporally, beginning with infinite reproducibility, they of this concept by way of Worry about the Govern- a consideration of what he defy the oblivion of the past an analysis of one impor- ment,” which he read as an depicted as a near-ubiqui- and attain a sort of constant tant instan- tous phrase: simultaneity, a “now” that tiation of “Be Here is the eternal present but an “haute Now.” He is also eternal transience. banal” traced this Noel Gallagher of Oasis aesthetic, phrase from illustrated this point well namely Ram Dass’s when he claimed that the the mu- 1971 book of band’s album Be Here sic of the that title to Now was the perfect music Talking the phrase’s for the moment it arrived, Heads. most recent which for any listener is the Hansen’s manifestation present. —D.L.

Mix II Geoffrey Conference organizer Jens Cox (Uni- Schellhammer (left) with keynote versity of speaker Eckhard Schumacher Washington) (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität) opened the first afternoon panel on analysis drew on a number endorse- Friday with of French theorists (specifi- ment of a presenta- cally Maurice Blanchot), the every- tion entitled as well as on the affirma- day and as “Signal Pro- tive account of bourgeois a “Hege- cessing: Of society in the writings of lian love song,” “Found a on the pop culture stage as Mix Tapes & Narrative in Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Job,” and “The Big Coun- the name of the 1997 album ‘Popliteratur.’” Hegel. Hansen character- try.” The final conclusion by the British pop group According to Cox, mix ized the “haute banal” as of the presentation was Oasis. He then analyzed tapes as a cultural phe- a celebration of the com- that “haute banal” actually the crucial appeareance of nomenon occupy a fairly pletely quotidian aspects of depicts a bourgeois fantasy this phrase in Benjamin defined historical period, our everyday lives, aris- which amounts to a (Hege- von Stuckrad-Barre’s 1998 from about 1979 to 1996. ing from the expansion of lian, rather than Marxian) “pop” novel Soloalbum. In As artifacts of “pop,” mix the middle class and the “reflective endorsement of this manner, Schumacher tapes represent a relatively universalization of urban the everyday,” one which uncovered the complex uncomplicated subjectiv- experience. Hansen asks exhibits bourgeois utopia- interplay of music and ity—unlike postmoder- us to direct our attention nism and is thus not neces- writing in contemporary nity—where legibility is the to the “space/time” where sarily available to everyone. culture. primary purpose. Through quotation, one arrives at a from Goethe’s Werther and transposed to the text and, aestheticizes conscious- new work: a personal mes- his own literary and musi- like a record collection, the ness, emancipates one from sage mediated by profes- cal creations. An impor- tape-as-novel helps make norms and values. The use sional musicians for what tant aspect of these “mix sense of the world. of brand names becomes is customarily an audience tapes” is that they contain Sofie Nielsen(Roskilde branding, literally. A certain of one. The construction of Wibeau’s own work, but University) discussed “Pop jumble of discourses pre- this message and the recep- no signposts of its mean- & Aesthetization, or, The vails, where the signified is tion of meaning are central ing—which is why Willi Terror of Aesthetics & the lost and only the surface of in this process. The com- does not understand them. Aesthetics of Terror.” She a word-mass remains. As a piler’s task is to organize Edgar has failed to master specifically referred to parody of “lifestyle litera- songs into a cohesive array. the medium: He does not Joachim Bessing’s novel ture” (e.g. Stuckrad-Barre), They represent a “now channel others’ work to Wir Maschine to illustrate this could be seen as cul- made from the then” (i.e. make legible his own mean- the relationship between tural criticism, or even cul- an already existent record ing. Still, the device of the pop and aestheticization. tural pessimism. Violence, collection); the author is at mix tape allows the author Pop can stand for life- destruction, and terror the same time present and a certain satirical play with style, superficiality, and occur in space, not time. not present; tapes are nec- the material. the “now.” It continues Juxtapositions supplant the essarily historical; there is Neumeister’s Gut laut the 300-year process of plot. The destruction of cit- intimate engagement with (1998) presents the most modernization and has ies represents the triumph the recipient at the time of radical incorporation of mix many predecessors (such as of art over consumption. making the tape, yet there tapes. It is a collage of pop dandyism). Aesthetization Terror is represented as a is also a narcissistic mo- music references employ- can serve as enlightenment, momentary experience, ment—a tape is a gift with ing various techniques of but it acts dialectically: It purely aesthetic, without strings attached. quoting. Cox refers to this can both construct cultural meaning. The terrorists’ Cox reviewed the use as a “surplus of allusion” norms and rid us of them. dream community is real- of mix tapes in three nov- characteristic of the DJ For some, aesthetization ized through this aesthetiza- els: Nick Hornby’s High culture. Neumeister mim- represents the new face of tion. The destroyed world Fidelity, Ulrich Plenzdorf’s ics the mix-tape method, capitalism, while Bessing offers a new order—a new Die neuen Leiden des but on another level: The sees a positive function of aesthetic of beautiful new jungen W., and Andreas compiler is elevated to the freeing one from reason. colors and shapes. It is also Neumeister’s Gut laut. In position of a professional Pop depicts both consumer- a counterpart to individual- Hornby’s text, the choice “text jockey.” Cohesion is ism and its problems, and ization. and arrangement of songs is achieved through associa- hedonism can be construed Stefan Mesch (Uni- key, and any explanations tion, offering a picture of as both liberation and a versity of Hildesheim) are tautological. The songs the cultural landscape. It is coping strategy. presented a paper on the comment on each other, partially a reconstruction of Wir Maschine can satiric columnist Max Goldt and the message, or narra- youth, but the emphasis lies be read as “anti-pop”: It (“Mostly Harmless? Max tive, unfolds itself as they on col- are played. The tapes in lage and the novel serve as a means citation. of making contact with Message people; even non-musicians is both can participate in this activ- related to ity, introducing both them- and con- selves and new music to structed others. However, in Cox’s from a view, the tapes also show a growing malfunction of communica- accumu- tion. lation of In Plenzdorf’s 1975 clues. novel, Edgar Wibeau leaves Mix-tap- behind tapes of passages ing is min, every- In the 1960s, drug use in thing indicated ed German history through German literature had the the tip of an a chronicle of language. function of provoking the iceberg that Mesch designates this as bourgeois lifestyle, and it could lead to a “meta-pop” and as a tactic adhered to a certain pro- greater pic- of the Frankfurt School— gram or theory of the ex- ture of human ”everything is culture.” pansion of consciousness. culture. These Mesch compared Goldt to In the 1990s, drug use no leftist perspec- Harald Schmidt, another longer represented a provo- tives, however, modern-day “dandy” on the cation or utopian longings, also suspected German scene. Whereas but rather belonged to the mass culture Schmidt’s approach is more dandy lifestyle—designer of being a kind deconstructionist, however, drugs, for example, were an of “opiate” and Goldt’s method has an edi- integral element of party- distraction. fying quality. ing. Max Goldt Chinese “pop litera- emerged in the Mix III ture” is a relatively new 1980s along Weijia Li (Ohio State Uni- phenomenon. It belongs to with a new versity) opened the third the post-Communist youth Geoff Waite (German Studies) mix with a paper on the during his featured address generation of culture and represents a writers, and as topic of “The Expansion of certain Western orienta- part of a group Consciousness & the Sad- tion. Alongside uses of dening of Soul: Intoxica- Goldt—Turning the Ev- calling itself Die Neue brand names and English- tion in German & Chinese eryday into a Battlefield of Frankfurter Schule. Goldt language words, drug use Meanings”). Goldt can be could be seen also figures prominently. considered the “guru” of as replacing The popularity of the genre the pop litterateurs of the the old Kaba- owes in part to a govern- mid-1990s. rett tradition. ment ban. The approach The aftermath of the Starting in to the drug theme, how- industrial revolution also 1989, he wrote ever, differs in Chinese pop provided the means and for the main- literature. In this context, technology for delivering stream satire drugs represent a means “cultural dope.” A tension journal Titanic, of withdrawal, numbing, between “high culture” and which was forgetting—in Li’s terms, “pop” evolved, particularly known for its Seelenbetrübung. The types in Germany. Seriousness sharp mockery of drugs used (heroin in the was a long-standing norm of the Kohl Chinese novels) partly ac- of the German literary es- regime. Yet count for this function, but tablishment, which avoided Goldt, as the it can also be explained by entertainment and everyday collector of China’s specific geography banality. Sociologically, empty media and history. the erstwhile gap between phrases, acted Li summarized the dif- “high” and “low” culture more as an ference between the treat- corresponded to the rift educator and ment of drug use in German between upper classes and enlightener in and Chinese pop literature the masses, yet with mass the spirit of the under the headings of Ko- distribution, entertainment earlier Frankfurt School. Pop Literature.” He used kainpopliteratur and Hero- became available to all. His columns made use of a historical and compara- inpopliteratur, respectively. The representatives of the simple culture and attempt- tive approach to track the The differences between Frankfurt School focused ed to debunk stereotypes. significance of drugs in the two types of literature on the significance of mass His criticism was relatively German and Chinese pop reflect the biological effects culture; for Walter Benja- mild-mannered and record- literature. of the drugs used, the corre- sponding flow of language promotion and distribution pears to be losing its critical further aspect of “naco” is (agitated versus ponderous, of Valley of the Dolls. In a momentum, to be tending the bilingualism inherent to sad, and weightless), and a way, men could be viewed toward its own commer- its spread; each new T-shirt transcendental/metaphysi- as ironic distractions for cialization, and to be giving creates a hybrid cultural cal versus an a-metaphysi- women. —M.M. way to a purely commercial background that draws cal quality to the texts. brand of “Euro-pop.” from Central American, Ken Roon (Binghamton Mix IV In the second paper, the Latino and North American University) concluded the The theme that unified the Latino pop phenomenon of culture. day with a paper called “A fourth “mix” of the pop “naco” illustrates a similar The final paper of the Room with Some Dolls: conference was the ambi- structural problem. The mix was “Popular Latin Virginia Woolf & Jac- guity of popular culture as paper “¿Naco es chido? American Outlaws Popping queline Susann.” In his both a reproduction of, and (It’s hip to be naco?): Up Across the Border—The presentation, Roon wanted resistance to, the dominant Authenticity and Cultural Case of Peter Neissa’s The to explore the distinction ideology. Production of the Meaning Druglord,” presented by between “high” and “low” The first paper, deliv- of Naco,” given by Ana Pablo Martínez Diente literature and how gender ered by Daniela Bute of Perez and Mateo Muñoz (Vanderbilt University). often plays a role in such the University of Western of the University of Mary- The paper showed how a designations—that is, the Ontario and entitled “Popu- land, showed how a T-shirt similar cultural hybridity standards are set by men. lar Music in Romania after company has capitalized on (what Diente referred to In fact, Susann was the Fall of Communism,” the ambiguity of the word as a “Big Bang” of “con- effectively the “queen of showed how this problem naco. Exhibiting a range of tinental consciousness”) 1960s pop literature.” Her manifests itself in the tran- meanings such as low-class, and ambiguity informs novel Valley of the Dolls is sition from communism to uncouth, lewd, macho, rac- the pop icon status of the the best selling fiction work capitalism in Romania. Un- ist (as well as the campy figure of the Central and in history, with 50 million der the repressive Commu- reversal of all those con- South American outlaw and copies sold. According to nist regime, certain genres notations, not to mention druglord. Roon, such sales figures of popular music, notably their ironic reappropriation imply the importance of a the “Pan-Balkan” genre, as well), “naco” is a funda- Featured Address text. became associated with mentally overdetermined In his remarks entitled Susann’s life and work subversive thinking and pop phenomenon, whose “‘Pop Goes the Weasel’: reflect the main concerns of populist resistance move- interpretations prolifer- After the Question of Pop,” Virginia Woolf’s A Room ments. After the collapse of ate as rapidly as each new Cornell German Studies of One’s Own: the exiling the regime, the music ap- T-shirt is produced. One Professor Geoff Waite at- and neglect of women writers. A large segment of the population is thus ignored. In terms of its themes and impressive sales figures, how- ever, Susann’s novel can also be seen as a partial circumvention of male-established structures. The development of mass media af- forded new pos- sibilities for the tempted to infiltrate pre- fast—and easy-to-summa- type of music at once truly the Turtles to illustrate his cisely the aforementioned rize—answers, once Profes- global and distinctively point. ambiguity of the word sor Waite had popped the Japanese. Paul Cook from “pop” (understanding the question. —J.D. In the second paper of the University of South word as both a cultural the mix, “The Ontology of Carolina presented a pa- movement and a linguistic Mix V Sampling,” Zed Adams per on “Playing through signifier) and to explode it Demetrios Jason Lallas (University of Chicago) ‘Pla(y)giarisms’; or, Re- from the inside. “Pop” re- from the University of Wis- raised the seemingly simple peating Differently: Digital fers to the populus, consid- consin, Madison opened question: What is sam- Audio Sampling in Hip- ered as both the revolution- the fifth mix with a paper pling? Adams began by Hop Music as Rhetorical ary class of the multitudo entitled “Japanoize: Con- contrasting two dominant Opposition.” His analysis, and the repressed, exploited temporary Avant-Rockism views about the nature of which focused on the masses of the vulgus. & Global Vectors of Ex- this phenomenon (i.e. the Grandmaster Flash album “Pop” is also the sound a perimental Pop Art Devel- use of pre-existing record- Adventures on the Wheels spindle makes during the opment.” The paper traced ings in hip hop music and of Steel and invoked Brian production of textiles, a Japan’s changing role in the production). On the first of Massumi’s book Parables slang word for the pawning global culture of pop mu- these views, which informs for the Virtual: Movement, of goods in exchange for sic. Whereas in the 1970s most of US copyright law, Affect, Sensation, overcame quick cash, and a euphe- Japan registered in global unauthorized sampling is the traditional treatment mism for murder owing to pop consciousness primar- literally “theft,” and hence of sampling as a spurious the popping sound of a gun- ily as a market/audience any use of a sample re- appropriation of content shot. Any question of pop, for “Western” pop music quires the permission of and concentrated instead therefore, inevitably brings (e.g. Cheap Trick’s famous the “original” artist. The on the effects of the sample together the problems of shows at Budokan), and second view shares with the on the listener. The paper production, the market, in the 1980s Japan figured first the premise that sam- borrowed and critically and violence, in relation to in a number of pop hits as pling is theft, but it gives employed notions such as the two poles of popular the object of xenophobic this premise an affirmative “intensity” (from Gilles revolution and economic paranoia (“Mr. Roboto”) twist by declaring, with Deleuze) and kairos (a exploitation. The conclu- or crude racial sterotyping Igor Stravinsky, that “great term from Greek rhetoric sion of Professor Waite’s (“Turning Japanese”), Japa- artists steal.” On this view, signifying the “opportune remarks (which ranged nese “noize” bands (Ruins, which draws its author- moment for speech”) in from medieval Latin to a The Boredoms, Cosmos, ity from the use of collage order to describe sampling film adaptation of Chester etc.) now figure as some of and pastiche techniques in as an art in which listeners’ Himes, with detours though the most highly-regarded modernist artworks (Picas- expectations are continually Spinoza, Cockney rhyme and sought-after producers so, T.S. Eliot, etc.), “theft” created and disrupted, and slang, and Italian cinema) of pop music on the global is essential to the creative which does not conform to tended toward the difficulty scene. Lallas sought to process, and hence should the logic of signification. of situating the “pop cult- account for the particular not be prohibited. Adams The affect, the effect, and ists” (namely, among oth- prestige Japanese bands moved from his account of the event were the coordi- ers, the present gathering of currently enjoy among the these two dominant views nates that shaped Cook’s intellectuals talking about musically hip by delving to the presentation of his interpretation, which em- pop) in relation to this com- into the history of the mu- own, novel view, namely phasized the idea of “rep- plex of problems. Given sic. Describing the manner that sampling is not a form etition with a difference” the conviction (performed in which Japanese musi- of “theft” at all, but rather in its various shapes—the in the talk itself) that the cians combined Krautrock, a form of representation, pastiche, the parody, and necessity of posing the free style jazz, psychadelia, namely a representation of the movement from aesthet- question of pop also neces- and numerous other musi- the experience of listening ics to ontology. sitates overdetermining and cal influences to create to old records. Adams used undermining the question a unique hybrid, Lallas a recording (“Transmitting Mix VI as much as possible, the concluded by talking about Live from Mars”) in which In the sixth and final mix, audience would have been the intriguing, paradoxical hip hop artists De La Soul Christian Kumpe, a mistaken to expect hard and nature of “Japanoize”: a sample a 1968 recording by Berlin-based ethnographer and musician, suggested a 1990s secured the con- resented by the voice of construction of style was different approach to rock tinuation of the psychadelic David Bowie). The detuned interpreted, in Jean Genet’s hermeneutics and backed gesture. piano in the recording also manner, as the refusal of his argument with an at- Alan Tormey of Princ- played an important role in hegemony and as rebellion tempt at a phenomenology eton University provided Tormey’s analysis, repre- through style. Punk is not of gestures. The paper em- a detailed musicological senting a decadent bour- only pure style, but also braced a history of psy- analysis of the narrative geois humanism, disfigured refusal of style, in the spirit chedelia, focusing on such strategies in Lou Reed’s by technology. of a riot movement which indexical musical moments “Satellite of Love.” This The final paper of the loves to be hated. Reaves as those represented by The song, Tormey argued, cre- conference was James called Hebdige’s reading Doors, Pink Floyd, and ates meaning through its Reaves’s (University of of punk a “sad reading of Einstürzende Neubauten. strategic deviations from Florida) commentary on subculture,” as it didn’t Kumpe also discussed the the standard formal conven- Dick Hebdige’s ground- oppose vehemently enough early experimental albums tions of the pop song (more breaking 1981 study of the commodification of of Kraftwerk and the pro- specifically, by means of an punk, Subculture: The punk as pop and its neutral- gressive music of Tangerine extra measure added at the Meaning of Style. Reaves’s izing appropriation through Dream. Even after the hey- end of the chorus). Tormey analysis employed Althus- mainstream culture. —A.R. day of psychadelia, Kumpe read the song as a (failed) serian concepts to make suggested, the psychedelic attempt to mediate between sense of punk culture and David Low, Martins revival of New Wave mu- human emotion (repre- its resistance to hegemonic Masulis, Josh Dittrich, sic, the British independent sented by Reed’s voice) and culture through style. The & Arina Rotaru are acts of the mid 1980s, and the dehumanizing effects of music of disaffected immi- graduate students in the rave scene of the early modern technology (rep- grants and the subcultures’ German Studies.

Museum Exhibit: Watercolors by Lyonel Feininger

In 1887, Lyonel Feininger (1871–1956) sailed from New York City to Germany and enrolled in Hamburg’s Kunstgewerbeschule. A year later he was attending the Kunstakademie in Berlin and, in 1893, he embarked on a fifteen-year career as an illustrator. He drew regularly for a number of Ber- lin’s satirical journals, and by the turn of the century he was recognized as one of the leading caricaturists in Germany.

As Feininger’s style evolved into the angular and light- filled aesthetic for which he is perhaps best known, he remained at the heart of the avant-garde in Germany. He exhibited with Der Blaue Reiter and was close to the artists of Die Brücke. In 1919 he was invited to Weimar by Walter Gropius to join the inaugural staff of the Bauhaus, where he was placed in charge of the graphic workshop and served as an artist-in- residence until the school closed in 1933.

The watercolors that he produced during these productive years first found their voice in what he called Naturnotizen, sketches generated while working directly in nature. These studies, shorthand notes made to later prompt his visual and emotional memory to be later realized in charcoal or ink. Alternatively the sketch would form the foundation for a watercolor, which he felt could stand alone as an independent statement.

A colleciton of Feininger’s watercolors was exhibited at the Johnson Museum of Art in March. Recent Dissertations

Thoughts on the Founding of a Catholic Science: about operatic culture? Its form, its content, or simply its price Science, Society and the Syllabus of Errors in structure? The decline of the old bourgeois culture which German Catholicism, 1820–1869 had supported opera before 1914 meant that its heritage was Richard Schaefer (2005, Advisor: Dominick LaCapra) placed in question. Would “an opera for every day” still be This dissertation investigates how, between 1820 and 1869, opera? Sources include the files of the Prussian state theater German-speaking Catholic scholars developed a new and administration; the files of the Ministry of State; the records critical sensibility as theorists of Catholicism. It evaluates of Volksbuhne annual meetings, as well as the organization’s theological, philosophical, and other texts for how they made published journals; and contemporary newspapers and music “Catholicism” the measure of theoretical and normative journals. authority in a sustained campaign against the Enlightenment, German cultural nationalism, and especially modern sci- The Cunning Lust: Aesthetic and Political ence. It shows how, by responding to what they perceived to Perspectives on Masochism be the corrosive subjectivism of Protestant reason latent in Torben Lohmueller (2005, Advisor: Anette Schwarz) these aspects of secular society, Catholic scholars affirmed the While the works of Alphonse Donatien de Sade have widely confessional community as the relevant frame of reference impacted aesthetic and critical discussions in 20th-century for articulating an alternative vision of academic scholarship. avant-garde art and critical theory, the supposed ‘inventor’ of This dissertation thus examines a mode of Catholic differen- masochism, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, has been largely tiation from secular society, not as a set of discrete ideas, but neglected by scholars and critics alike. Only in recent years in terms of a discourse of self-articulation that enabled a range and in a tardy response to Gilles Deleuze’s Presentation of statements on the nature of Catholicism. This perspective de Masoch (1969) have Sacher-Masoch and the subject of on Catholic theory as a discourse of self-articulation undercuts masochism received some attention within debates in both the current tendency to evaluate Catholic intellectual history German and Cultural Studies. Die verschlagene Lust expands as either “liberal” or “ultramontane,” and shows how these the contexts in which Sacher-Masoch’s work has hitherto been tendencies were part of a much more complex spectrum of treated to problems in philosophy (master slave dialectic), opinion that was severely curtailed only with the appearance confessional writing (Rousseau, recent queer studies), history of the Syllabus of Errors and the dogmatization of infallibility (Sacher-Masoch’s historical and political writings), art history in 1870–71. (strategies of visual appropriation), and performance studies (Nietzsche, Cansinos Asserts, performance art of the 1960’s). The Kroll Opera and the Politics of Cultural Examined under these cross-disciplinary perspectives, mas- Reform in the Weimar Republic ochism proofs to be both a political and an aesthetic strategy, Rachel Nussbaum (2005, Advisor: Michael Steinberg) circumventing the dialectical impasses of transgression (as This dissertation deals with changes in cultural policy during in Sad(e)ism and the early avant-garde) by operating through the Weimar Republic and how they affected the structure of disavowal, seduction, and experimental reconfigurations of the German opera public. The expansion of the opera public to the given. While in existing research Sacher-Masoch’s work include social groups who had previously been excluded was has been predominantly classified as a phenomenon particular here combined with an attempt to reform opera aesthetically, to the late nineteenth century, I argue that we must consider its to create an “everyday opera” which would do away with refusal of artistic authorship and destabilisation of the reality kitsch and make opera a viable art form capable of speaking to principle as prefiguring post-modern theory and aesthetics. a modern audience. The ideas of the Volksbühne centered on community (Gemeinschaft) which involved using the theater Echoes of Expression: Text, Performance, and as a way of uniting German society. However, as the opera History in Mozart’s Viennese Instrumental Music audience actually expanded to include the working class and Thomas Irvine (2005, Advisor: Neal Zaslaw) white-collar workers, conflict surrounding the idea ofBildung This dissertation begins with a source-critical problem with (self-formation) was inevitable. What would have to change consequences for performance: the many differences between autographs and disseminated sources of Mozart’s Viennese one examines Kant’s Zum ewigen Frieden in the historical instrumental music. This problem serves as a foil for two lines context of its writing. Kant engages in a performative argu- of inquiry: the notion of ‘performance’ in the late-eighteenth ment for publicity in his critique of Prussian imperialism and century and the place of performance in historical scholarship. the censorship of revolutionary views. Whereas Kant’s essay The first chapter traces the recent history of Mozart scholar- has been conventionally read apart from its historical context, ship in the context of wider debates about writing history—is Kleist’s Die Herrmannsschlacht has been interpreted strictly there a musical way to write music history? The second chap- in terms of the historical moment of its writing. Chapter two ter compares traditional musicological techniques of textual argues instead for a rhetorical reading of Kleist’s play in editing with more recent developments in the fields of ‘perfor- which language emerges as both the central theme of the text mance studies’. In the third chapter, the growing interest in the and an agent of anti-imperial violence. Chapter three turns to expressive qualities of human language in German aesthetic an alternative conception of human freedom grounded in op- thought beginning around 1770 serves as background to an position. In his Phänomenologie des Geistes, Hegel produces examination of shifts in thinking about the place of expression a performative narrative of the development of subjectivity in in musical performance. The fourth chapter appraises two per- relations of violence. Chapter four examines the appropria- formances, one by the composer himself and one in Wilhelm tion of Kant and Hegel by the Japanese wartime philosophers Heinse’s 1795 novel Hildegard von Hohenthal. In the fifth Kiyoshi and Hajime. Both defend Japanese imperialism by chapter an instance of ‘multi-textuality’ in the String Quintet arguing for a form of freedom in which the subject negates its K. 593 is studied in detail. Finally, a short epilogue suggests attachment to the imperial state. that the arrival of both new theories of linguistic expression and the birth of ‘historicism’ around the time Mozart was ac- Masculinity, War, and Refusal: Vicissitudes of tive as a composer is no coincidence. German Manhood before and after the Cold War Steven Gardiner (2004, Advisor: Davydd Greenwood) Kant’s Noisy Neighbors: The Experience of Music Over the last two centuries, Germany has experienced several and Community in the Critique of Judgment shifts in “the war system,” an important determiner of mascu- Marianne Tettlebaum (2004, Advisor: Annette Richards) linity. The total surrender in 1945, combined with the asso- This dissertation examines the role of music in Immanuel ciation of the Nazi regime with heroic masculinity, opened Kant’s Critique of Judgment and asks why Kant attaches so the door in post-World War II Germany for new forms of little aesthetic value to the experience of music at precisely masculinity. The new configuration increased the importance the moment his contemporaries begin to celebrate it. In order of refusal and decreased the importance of obedience. Until to answer this question, we must recover a particular moment 1990, Germany remained a nation both divided and occupied, in the history of music and music aesthetics in which musical leading to the valorization of refusal. In an occupied society, experience was unthinkable without a concept of community. the relationship of masculinity to the nation-state is shifted. This moment is represented by a particular nexus of late eigh- At the same time, market pressures led to a more individuated teenth-century thinkers. According to Reichardt and Herder, society—though refusal became more common in all Western musical experience attains meaning as the experience of a societies, none of the other traditional military cultures be- community rather than of a single individual. Kant’s problem came so accommodating to the idea of refusal. This is attribut- with music is that he cannot tolerate the kind of community ed to the institutionalization of refusal within the Bundeswehr, that it fosters, for that community is based on feeling rather and its valorization as subsequent generations encounter the than on the exchange of ideas and concepts. This largely his- failed refusal of the Nazi period. These trends can be under- torical consideration of community and aesthetic experience stood through an analysis of changing masculinity as dem- provides a theoretical foundation for an aesthetics of musical onstrated through a variety of forms of evidence. Finally, the experience that can, via the community, bring feeling into the relationship between war and masculinity itself should be academic discourse on music. seen in a longer evolutionary perspective, and assumptions about inevitability should be challenged through comparative From Perpetual Peace to Imperial War: ethnography and review of the archeological evidence. “Violence” in Kant, Kleist, Hegel, Miki and Tanabe John Kim (2004, Advisor: Geoff Waite) Claiming Honor: Injury, Honor, and the Legal This dissertation examines philosophical and literary con- Process in Saxony, 1650–1730 figurations of ‘violence’ in discourses of human freedom Eileen Crosby (2004, Advisor: David Sabean) and imperial subjugation in Germany and Japan. Without a This dissertation examines the practice of lodging suits for definition in itself, ‘violence’ serves the critical function of Ehrverletzung (damage to honor) in the law courts of early disclosing norms orienting social and political life. Chapter modern Germany. Most suits in Saxon courts employed a simple, oral complaint process in which a litigant’s ability to childbirth. In so doing, it traces connections between the provide credible proof in the form of witness testimony or political, social, cultural, and experiential levels. The dis- personal oath often determined the outcome of a case. The sertation argues that long-term social forces, in particular result was a legal process that permitted litigants to engage medicalization, reconstructed the way women experienced in reciprocal rituals of non-violent, legal confrontation. This pregnancy and childbirth and subjected women’s bodies to perpetuated the link between honorable status and legal capac- new forms of social discipline. However, medicalization ity that had once been explicit in medieval European law. proceeded less smoothly than its proponents desired, for Contemporary views of the phenomenon of Ehrverletzung older notions—such as folk theories about the power of the reveal a disjuncture between the discourse of honor expressed maternal imagination—persisted. Ordinary women were in the laws of an early modern territorial state and the practice active participants in these processes of change, both driving of honor by that state’s subjects. By the early eighteenth cen- them forward and resisting them, and thus, in turn, influenced tury, a body of educated opinion had emerged that sought to broader discourses on population policy, social hygiene, the curtail uses of the Ehrverletzung complaint, especially its use state, and the family. Women’s experiences were both shaped by peasants, artisans, laborers, and the poor. This desire came by and helped to shore up two problematic concepts: a notion into conflict with the normative understanding of early mod- of the body politic, the Volkskörper, that was taken literally in ern society, which saw an inclusive social hierarchy, in which German political discourse; and ‘sacrificial motherhood,’ the (nearly) everyone had a claim to honor, as the foundation of exclusive celebration of suffering, duty, and self-abnegation social stability. in maternity at the expense of love, joy, and other positive qualities. Both of these notions cast women (and their babies) Haydn’s Vocality and the Ideal of True String Quartets as mere means to an end and laid the groundwork for fascist Nancy November (2003, Advisor: Neal Zaslaw) policies after 1933. This dissertation offers new perspectives on Haydn and the string quartet, proposing that there was no unified conception “Of Course the German Woman should be Modern”: of this music at that time. ‘Truth’ in this music was consid- The Modernization of Women’s Appearance during ered a function of equality and homogeneity, ideals that were National Socialism being upheld for instrumental music in general. However, Yvonne Houy (2002, Advisor: David Bathrick) another idea of truth, which resided more in the affective, This interdisciplinary dissertation analyzes discourses about immediate, and ‘songful’ properties of music in performance, female beauty in Germany between 1928 and 1945 in order was also theorized and extolled for chamber music. The to understand the interwoven and at times contradictory polit- study focuses on this latter strand of the dialectic, exploring ical and economic functions of the National Socialist female an idea of ‘vocality,’ as a particularly ‘truthful’ or ‘authentic’ beauty ideal. Chapters 1 and 2 analyze discourses among the mode of experiencing music. The eighteenth-century idea of National Socialist elite (and within the cultural policies of instrumental vocality is explored in detail here in the case their institutions) who advocated the modern-looking woman of Haydn’s chamber music, the string quartets in particular. as the National Socialist female beauty ideal. They argued The earlier listeners’ conceptions of Haydn’s ‘vocality’ are that a modern-looking female ideal attracted urban women investigated in two studies of his quartets, which explore to the party and benefited the German economy. The vis- eighteenth-century notions of aria as a sonic tableau, and ible characteristics of the modern National Socialist female the concept of melancholy song. These provide contexts for beauty ideal were based on international fashion trends that works that are both marginalized (the earlier quartets) and emerged between 1929 and 1931 and continued until 1945. privileged (later quartets) in accordance with the ideology of Chapters 3 and 4 analyze discourses about fashion in popular ‘Classical’ string quartets. ‘Vocality’ encompasses character- women’s magazines, which argued that urban women should istic features of Haydn’s quartets that are not subsumed by wear German-made modern fashions and use cosmetics to this ideology; it provokes further ways of experiencing these beautify Germany, contribute to the nation’s economy, and works. support National Socialism. To maximize profits and mini- mize censorship, the private film industry negotiated between Contested Conceptions: Experiences and völkisch and pro-modern discourses about female beauty. Discourses of Pregnancy and Childbirth in Chapter 5 analyzes the narratives and mise-en-scène of en- Germany, 1914–1933 tertainment films that staged positive modern-looking female Patricia Stokes (2003, Advisor: Isabel Hull) characters displaying Hollywood-style glamour but not the This dissertation analyzes how discursive and institutional visual characteristics of ‘decadence.’ changes in the context of World War I and the Weimar Re- public reshaped women’s experiences with pregnancy and On April 26, Eric Santner, Philip and Ida Romberg Pro- fessor in Modern Germanic Studies and Department Chair at the University of Chicago, presented the Hein- rich and Alice Schneider Distinguished Memorial Lecture in German Studies. His talk was entitled “Neighbors and Other Creatures” and sought to bring the methodology of psychoanalysis to bear on the problem of alterity as it is manifested as neighborly love and creaturely life in the spheres of religious experience (revelation), politics (sovereignty), and literature. The key struc- tural concept that unites these spheres for Santner is “signifying stress,” namely the physical and mental stress that the subject experiences in response to the desire of the other. Since that desire is articulated through a claim to validity in excess of meaning, the subject is captivated by the other’s desire, but incapable of finding a meaningful, adequate response. Such stressful suspension in a state between animal need and human communication constitutes the subject as a creature. Santner applied this structure of validity in excess of meaning to the “Nichts der Offenbarung” in the writings Gershom Scholem, Walter Benjamin’s concept of “Kreatürlichkeit” as developed in relation to the work of Franz Kafka, and to Giorgio Agamben. In the latter’s work, the problem of political sovereignty is haunted by the captivating excess of the state of exception, and creaturely life emerges as an analog to bare life. Whereas the method of cultural studies only understands alterity as difference, Santner maintains that psychoanalysis can approach alterity more productively as proximity to the creaturely and thereby locate deep analogies between the religious, the political, and the literary. —Josh Dittrich is a graduate student in German Studies.

Adalbert Stifter at 200 An International Symposium Organized by: Ute Maschke 20 - 21 October 2006 The Department of German Studies and the German Cultural Studies Institute will hold a joint international symposium on the Austrian writer Adalbert Stifter (1805 – 1868). Adalbert Stifter has long been viewed as the natural heir to the Great Classical Tradition; especially in Europe, he is seen as an important precursor of modern writing from Franz Kafka to Thomas Bernhard to W.G. Sebald. On the occasion of his 200th birthday last year, major universities and university presses both in Austria and Germany held widely noticed conferences and published materials challenging existing literary scholarship on the 19th-century; in the U.S., however, these events have remained almost unnoticed. This symposium will be the first event of note in the U.S. for nearly 15 years; it will provide an opportunity to re-read the German-Austrian and the Austrian-American dialogue from a par- ticular and exceptional angle. We hope it will revive the cross-Atlantic dialogue and contribute to a major re-evaluation of the writer and his writing. The sym- posium will serve as an initial stage for the edition of an essay collection to be published with a leading journal in German Studies. Colloquium Series Spring 2006 World Picture and theVerbal Epic, Document, the author’s writing with with writing author’s the merging by experience” extratextual and work tistic ar between distance “the collapsed which (1929), Alexanderplatz Berlin opus, magnum Döblin’s in found is argues, he lem, prob the to solution The fiction. and fact between distance the destabilizes which literature, in ity documentar of challenge the to attention draws Fore Giftmord ihr und Freundinnen beiden Die Döblin’s, of piece mentary docu a introducing By modernism. after realism of status the and Döblin on Alfred exclusively, not albeit focuses, that project book a into glimpse first a offered presentation Fore’s realism. nineteenth-century of backdrop the against factography” futuristic “post- to modern from movement German the on influences Soviet analyzed which reportage, Soviet and Weimardocumentary on dissertation his of chapter revised a is Mauthner,” and Döblin WorldPicture: Verbalthe and Document, “Epic, entitled paper, His Department. Studies German the for teaching presently is and Columbia from degree doctoral his received recently who Fellow toral Postdoc Mellon by paper a Auftakt impressive an found quium collo semester’s This on January 27 with with 27 January on Devon Fore, Fore, Devon (1923), (1923), ------enced Döblin in the latter’s latter’s the in Döblin enced influ further Mauthner device. stylistic Rede erlebte uses that aesthetic logical graphosomato a in sulted re which experience,” embodied with cognition “reintegrate to technique literary a with perimented ex Döblin language. the of opment devel the and experiences somatic between link the on insisted who language, of philosopher a Mauthner, Fritz with engagement an after style “embodied” the at arrived Döblin writing. embodied producing thus living, his audience. the of members the among discussion engaging an stimulated presentation itself. event the than event an of tion documenta the less thus is Berlin own very Döblin’s of montage resulting The becoming. of process the in always is that writing embodied an of favor in “plot” of structures the of most discarded Döblin project, realist the of ing writ “theological” the reader. Avoiding the and characters, the narrator, the writer, the includes ously simultane that presentness epic an producing collapse, narrator the and narration the between boundaries the in together persons third and second, first, Merging becoming. of state a in constantly lin—is Ber world—Döblin’s the which in world-picture,” “verbal a draw to decision

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- - - Second World War. What united Germanyafterthe and itsroleincreatinga clarinetist GioraFeidmann on theworkofklezmer many.” Herpaperfocused Politics, andtheNewGer Holocaust: Music,Memory entitled “Klezmerizingthe paper onFebruary10, the secondcolloquium sity ofLondonpresented Rita Ottens New Germany Politics, andthe Music, Memory Holocaust: Klezmerizing the style—the dramatic ges Feidmann’s performance said Ottens, was aresultof vor ofhisaudiences. This, his concertsandthefer the near-religious toneof personality, highlighting sonal charismaandconcert tions ofFeidmann’s per presented vividdescrip music andmusician.She year acquaintancewithboth account ofhertwenty-two role inGermanythroughan standing ofFeidmann’s served tocreateanunder MuchofOttens’s talk period. ish cultureinthepostwar between GermansandJew in delineatingarelationship and theeffect thishashad to thepublicresponseit itself remainssecondary Ottens claimed.Hismusic by Feidmannonthestage, is symbolicallyactedout tween JewsandGermans, namely adialoguebe political levelafterthewar, had notbeenpossibleona oftheUniver ------tures he makes as he plays The structuring question the public eye. Kortner’s However, if Kortner’s and the understanding of of Marx’s paper was, in portrayal of the brutal, ani- biography was reflected in his melodies as handed to his words: How can we malistic Dr. Schön in Frank his onstage appearances, him by God—rather than conceptualize the idea of a Wedekind’s Erdgeist led to then it was his portayal of of any virtuosic talent. Her collective imaginary? Marx a collective conception of Shylock one month after paper, Ottens suggested, attempted to answer this Kortner as a non-German the Harlan scandal that attempts to uncover why question by looking back villain, and racist readings served to reestablish him Feidmann is shrouded in to Freud’s writings on the of Kortner’s performance as an autonomous subject this sort of mystery, why dream-work, understood, in abounded in right-wing through a “very concrete there are few critical studies Marx’s account, as a means newspapers such as Der act of revolting,” namely of his music, and why his to “cope with the desires Angriff. Marx suggested his recition of the famous audience is so religiously and anxieties of the day.” that Harlan’s onstage pun- line: “If you prick us, do we protective of him. In Marx’s paper, the ishment of Kortner seemed not bleed?” —P.B. Questions about Ot- Urszene that needed to be to forebode the punishment tens’s paper focused on coped with and collectively of the Jew in developing a more precise addressed was Veit Harlan’s Harlan’s later, discussion of the klezmer onstage physical attack––a infamous film, phenomenon in Germany slap––on his former friend Jud Süß, as if and the role it has played in Fritz Kortner, whom he ac- the closing ex- German–Jewish tensions. cused of making “an inap- ecution scene According to Ottens, the propriate approach” toward of that film reception of klezmer music his wife. Because Kortner were dormant continues to play a central was Jewish, the collective in the German role in the postwar German- reaction to this scene, par- unconscious, Jewish dialogue. —C.H. ticularly in the Berlin press, waiting to be brought forth contemporary given form. anxieties and A Slap and Its racial at- Echoes: titudes in a particularly Theatre Scandals sharp and Devon Fore (Mellon as Cultural disturbing Postdoctoral Fellow) way. Marx Dreamwork sees this Theatre leaves behind frus- release of tratingly few visible traces passions as a for researchers of the pres- dream-work ent to examine, and Peter occuring on Marx (Theatre Studies, the cultural, Johannes Gutenberg Uni- collective versity) acknowledged at level. What the outset of his colloquium sets this that histories of theater that event and the rely on physical remnants public reaction to it apart, such as torn tickets and however, is the fact that the program leaflets are em- two persons involved were barassingly inadequete for judged not only in light addressing the social status of their avowed political and transformative role views, but also of their on- of theater—in this case, stage performances, which during the period of the were in any case their most Weimar Republic in Berlin. crucial countenances in Robert Walser’s tell a story. As such, digres- engaged these themes with Schiller as provocative sion functions to prolong the aid of three organizing and polemical, yet also a Digressive the pleasure of anticipatory, categories. First, he dis- classicist. The provoca- Tactics and the unfulfilled longing. So too, cussed the “literary field” in tive aspects of Schiller’s digression allows Walser to existence at the time Schil- works are grounded in Narrativity of shift his focus from story to ler began to write, which his attempts to explode discourse and create mean- was dominated by Enlight- boundaries by experiment- Antinarrative ing precisely by virtue of enment thought. Secondly, ing, being polemical, and At the April 7th Collo- this otherwise non-goal- he used the term “Konstel- attempting to have par- quium, Sam Frederick directed activity. That is, lation” to delineate a set ticular dramatic effects (Ph.D. Candidate, German narrative digression allows of philosophical-aesthetic on his audience. Schiller Studies) discussed the first the narrator to turn from problems and themes cen- attempted to be a trend-set- chapter of his dissertation, that which is represented tral to Schiller’s work and ting authority in that he did entitled “Robert Walser’s in a story to the process of that of his contemporaries. not seek to maintain tradi- Digressive Tactics and the representing itself. In so Finally, Oesterle appropri- tional dramatic forms but Narrativity of Antinarra- doing, the reality of the rep- ated the term “Netzwerk” in rather collapsed distinctions tive.” Frederick’s paper resented world gives way to order to reveal the simulta- between poetry and phi- raised questions as to the the need to create illusion. neity of various discourses losophy, medicine, and his- structure, function, and Interestingly, this turn to circulating around 1800. tory. Because he integrated significance of various liter- the act of narration must Oesterle characterized contemporary and topical ary devices employed by itself reintegrate material into highly-devel- Robert Walser to undermine narrative ele- oped artistic forms, though, traditional narrative struc- ments subverted Schiller must be considered ture. Frederick maintained by the very mode a classicist. Oesterle con- that Walser’s disregard of narration cluded his discussion of for conventional narra- utilized in these Schiller by drawing atten- tive structure can be seen texts. —T.H. tion to the fact that while as a central structural and the romantic critics of thematic force in his prose, Schiller understood much which so often displaces the Schiller im story in order to foreground Streit und the desire to narrate and the Widerstreit act of narrating itself. Designating Walser’s On March 3, mode of narration as antin- Günter Oesterle arrative, given its narrative- (Institut für Germanistik, subversive qualities, Fred- Justus-Liebig-Universität erick examined digression Gießen) delivered an ani- as a constitutive element mated and insightful paper in Walser’s prose. Narra- entitled “Schiller im tive digression disrupts Streit und Widerstre- the goal-oriented, tension it.” In his discussion, resolving sequentiality of Oesterle developed traditional plot develop- a character sketch ment. Frederick likens this of Friedrich Schil- non-productive, meander- ler and addressed ing activity to walking with the question of why no particular destination. In Schiller constituted a Walser’s prose, there is thus model and counter- a deferral of any fulfillment model for the devel- Günter Oesterle that might otherwise be as- opment of Romantic (Institut für Germanistik, Justus- sociated with the desire to poetry. Oesterle Liebig-Universität Gießen) of Schiller quite aptly, they films place emphasis upon also, for that very reason, visual composition, fo- missed decisive aspects of cusing especially on such his work. —T.H. elements as signs and symbols, facades and exte- riority. They often replace New Art—New dialogue with “asynchro- Vision: Ottomar nous voice-overs” and “minimizing narration,” Domnick’s ‘Other’ and they “employ a strik- ingly associative but not Cinema of the psychologically expressive Adenauer Era sound-track.” Domnick’s films, Da- John E. Davidson, As- vidson notes, focus on the sociate Professor of Ger- tensions between external manic Languages and collective experiences Literature at Ohio State and the internal, private University, closed the experiences of individu- spring semester’s col- als. Davidson’s paper also loquium series with his includes a brief biographi- paper “New Art – New Vi- cal sketch of Domnick’s sion: Ottomar Domnick’s life, which emphasizes ‘Other’ Cinema and the that Domnick continually Adenauer Era.” The paper asserted that his primary addresses “the troubled profession was psychiatry relationship between psy- and that filmmaking was chological and cinematic only one of his “Neben- realism in German film,” wege.” Davidson argues September 8 in particular by focusing that, among other things, Cassandra Henry, PhD Candidate, German Studies on a rarely-viewed film it is Domnick’s delinea- Das Lied von der Erde & the Mahlerian Interplay of Song & Symphony created by the psychiatrist tion between the “vi- and experimental film- sual, aural and ‘character’ September 22 maker Ottomar Domnick, portions in cinema,” as Birgit Neumann Jonas. Davidson notes that well as his “aesthetically Professor, Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen the film was initially re- charged visualization of Fictions of Memory & Meta-Memory in Contemporary Literature ceived as controversial, yet th[e] modern dream of October 13 ultimately became “criti- classless-ness under the Ross Halvorsen, PhD Candidate, German Studies cally-acclaimed as map- endless revolutions of the Recognizing the Game in “Dantons Tod” ping out new possibilities capitalist machines,” that and marking a renewal for makes his work unique November 3 German cinema in the late and particularly helpful in Jochen Schulte-Sasse 1950s.” understanding the “physi- Professor, German, Scandinavian & Dutch, Minnesota Davidson argues that cal reality of the Adenauer Title TBA Domnick’s work offers period.” —G.G. “unique insights into November 17 Germany in the Adenauer Yuliya Komska, PhD Candidate, German Studies period” and, further, that Visual Nostalgia it breaks in very distinct Melanie Steiner, Cas- ways with the conventions sandra Henry, Paul December 1 of psychologically-real- Buchholz, Tim Haupt, Walter Hinderer istic narrative in cinema. & Grace Gemmell are Professor, German, Princeton University For instance, Davidson graduate students in Seinsausstand als Lebensfeier: Anmerkungen zu points out that Domnick’s German Studies. Heinrich von Kleists romantischer Todesauffassung Taking Exception with the Exception Friday 29 September & Saturday 30 September Law School Lounge, Myron Taylor Hall

10:00-11:00 10:00-11:00 Bernie Meyler Jason Frank (Law School, Cornell University) (Government, Cornell University) Economic Emergency Paradox and Popular Constitutionalism

11:00-12:00 11:00-12:00 Andrew Norris Susan Buck-Morss (Political Science, University of Pennsylvania) (Government, Cornell University) On the Exceptional and the Normal Sokurov’s Sovereign Trinity

12:15-1:15 12:15-1:15 Bonnie Honig Erik Vogt (Political Science, Northwestern University) (Philosophy, Trinity College / University of Vienna) The Miracle of Metaphor: Exception in Slavoj Žižek’s Political Thought Pluralizing Political Theology 2:45-3:45 2:45-3:45 Kam Shapiro Tracy McNulty (Political Science, Illinois State University) (Romance Studies, Cornell University) Politics is a Mushroom: Immanent Sources of Exception and The Commandment Against the Law: Decision Benjamin and Kant 3:45-4:45 3:45-4:45 Dominiek Hoens Gil Anidjar (Jan Van Eyck Academy, Maastricht) (Middle East & Asian Languages & Cultures, Columbia University) Above and Beneath Classification: On Bartleby and Michael K The Anti-Semitic Exception 5:00-6:00 5:00-6:00 Bruno Bosteels Jeffrey Librett (Romance Studies, Cornell University) (German, University of Oregon) States of Grace: Sovereignty and Liminality On León Rozitchner’s Critique of Subjection

The exception, Carl Schmitt wrote in Political Theology, is more interesting than the rule. The rule proves nothing; the exception proves ev- erything. In the exception the power of real life breaks through the crust of a mechanism that has become torpid by repetition. Contempo- rary theoretical discourses across multiple fields and disciplines—law, political theory, theology, history, literature, and philosophy—would seem to concur with this high estimation of the exception. And this high estimation has assumed political urgency in the wake of 9/11, with the contested legal status of enemy combatants and the invocation of executive privilege and discretion in waging purportedly new forms of warfare against a new kind of enemy. If theorists are not engaged explicitly with the language of norm and exception, then they address its dynamics through analogous discourses of event and miracle. The contemporary theoretical imagination is arguably captivated by the logic of the exception, in its absolute purity. To paraphrase Wittgenstein, a certain picture of law and normativity seems to hold us captive, and our theoretical vocabularies seem to repeat this picture to us inexorably.

How do we best account for the hold of the exception on the contemporary theoretical imagination? This conference will at once diagnose the hold of these preoccupations with the exception across the disciplines, while also inquiring into the costs of this captivation. Without falling back on a lost normativity, formalism, or legalism, we hope to raise a number of pressing political and theoretical questions: What conceptual rubrics are maintained and reiterated by the seemingly inexorable logics of norm and exception? What kinds of theoretical in- vestigation are authorized and precluded by this preoccupation? How do they structure our political discussions, and direct and constrain our political options?

Institute for German Cultural Studies Additional information about all events listed is avail- able on our website: www.arts.cornell.edu/igcs. Event Cornell University listings will be updated throughout the semester. If you 726 University Avenue would like to be added to our mailing list, please con- Ithaca, NY 14850 tact Robin Fostel ([email protected]). Contributions to German Cultural News are welcome. If you would like an event listed or have a brief review or article to submit, please contact Paul Buchholz (pjb45@ cornell.edu). www.arts.cornell.edu/igcs