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Newsletter of the Norbert Elias Foundation 20 Newsletter of the Norbert Elias Foundation EDITORS’ NOTES • This year marks the twentieth anniversary of the Norbert Elias Foundation. It was established by Elias himself in 1983 and designated, in effect, his sole heir and executor. Its central purpose is to promote knowledge of Elias’s ideas and to encourage others to develop them through their own work. • This year, too, Saskia Visser has completed ten years of outstanding service as Secretary to the Foundation, acting as its administrator and chief executive. • Figurations is approaching its tenth anniversary as well, with this, the twentieth issue. Strictly speaking issue 21 will mark the tenth anniversary of our first appearance which coincided with the 1994 ISA World Congress of Sociology in Bielefeld. • John Pratt, whose book Punishment and Civilisation was reviewed in Figurations 19, has been promoted to a personal chair at the Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. FROM THE NORBERT and exhibitions by the artists. The art- announcement will be made in Figu- ELIAS FOUNDATION ists will work in the ArtHAUS in Accra, rations 21, but in the meantime those founded by the Ghanaian artist Kofi who may be interested should contact Norbert Elias Memorial Setordji. The jury to award the stipend either Dr. Christoph König (Deutsches Artists’ Award will be composed of Kofi Setordji and Literaturarchiv, D–71666 Marbach- As is well known, Norbert Elias spent representatives of both the Goethe Insti- am-Neckar, Tel. +49-7144-848-432) or two years (1962−64) as Professor and tute and the National Museum. The first Professor Hermann Korte (Kleimannstr. head of the new Department of Sociol- award will be made in the early months 8, D–48149 Münster, Germany). ogy at the University of Ghana, where of 2004. After three years the scheme he acquired both a passionate liking will be evaluated. A prospectus is being for and an excellent collection of West prepared and will be available from the Advance Announcement: African art. In response to an initia- foundation. Fourth Norbert Elias Prize tive by Dr Artur Bogner, who was one See www.norberteliasfoundation.nl. 2005 of Elias’s assistants in Bielefeld in the early 1980s and himself became a Marbach Stipend We should like to alert readers in good Ghana specialist, the board of the Elias The German Literature Archive and time to the fact that the Fourth Norbert Foundation has agreed to establish an the Norbert Elias Foundation, Amster- Elias Prize will be awarded in 2005. annual award in his memory for a Gha- dam, will once again award a Marbach The Prize consists in a sum of €1000 naian artist. Hermann Korte had a meet- Graduate Stipend to undertake research and it will be awarded to a significant ing with Dr. Petra Raymond, Director for six months (starting not earlier than first work by a European author pub- of the Goethe Institute in Ghana, which autumn 2004) on the papers of Norbert lished between 1 January 2003 and will administer the scheme on the foun- Elias, which have been deposited in the 31 December 2004. Discussions are dation’s behalf, organising publicity German Literature Archive. A definitive in train about continuing collabora- Issue No.20 December 2003 Figurations 1 tion with the Premio Europeo Amalfi debates, research and the sheer variety ‘figurational sociology’ being to show organisation, but the Elias Prize will be of topics arising within figurational how many diverse aspects of society awarded whatever their outcome. sociology have moved forward. These are intertwined with each other − it is meetings have provided an occasion an unavoidable fact. The Prize is awarded ‘in commemora- for colleagues from around the world, tion of the sociologist Norbert Elias who otherwise keep in touch mainly To circumvent the problem Robert (1897–1990), whose writings, at once by e-mail, to meet each other in person suggests changing the title of the pro- theoretical and empirical, boldly and to enjoy more leisured discussions posed Thematic Group to ‘Civilising crossed disciplinary boundaries in the of their work, both in the sessions and Decivilising Processes’. This may social sciences to develop a long-term themselves and (typically) over drinks not be ideal − not everything we have perspective on the patterns of interde- afterwards. Many new faces, too, have discussed at previous congresses falls pendence which human beings weave appeared among those of the usual sus- easily under that heading − but it is the together’. The Norbert Elias Prize is pects on these occasions. best we can think of. If you can think intended to draw attention to a promis- of a better title, please e-mail Robert at ing young European scholar who has An ‘Ad Hoc Group’ is the lowest form [email protected]. published a first book in sociology or a of life in the ISA’s elaborate evolution- related discipline, although it is by no ary hierarchy, which extends all the Please also contact Robert if you would means necessary that Eliasian ideas be way up to the three or four dozen full- like to add your name to the list of sup- deployed in their work. The first Nor- blown ‘Research Committees’. The porters for the Thematic Group, and let bert Elias Prize was awarded in 1999 to problem with Ad Hoc Groups is that − him know whether you are provision- David Lepoutre for his book Coeur de successful as ours have been − approval ally thinking of attending the Durban Banlieue, the second in 2001 to Wilbert for their inclusion has to be sought from congress. van Vree for Meetings, Manners and the World Congress Programme Com- Civilisation, and the third in 2003 to mittee each time, and in every other Nikola Tietze for Islamische Iden- way they have to be arranged from titäten: Formen muslimischer Religi- scratch. Ad Hoc Groups are also allo- A SUPPRESSED POEM BY osität junger Männer in Deutschland cated only two sessions, often in unso- NORBERT ELIAS und Frankreich. cial hours (or rather, during what would In order to nominate a book for the otherwise be social hours in the pub) − Only a handful of poems in English were award, please send a letter of recom- although at Bielefeld we did somehow included in the volume Los der Men- mendation to wangle five sessions. schen published by Suhrkamp in 1987 to mark Norbert Elias’s ninetieth birthday. Saskia Visser With the 2006 World Congress in One of them has been widely admired Secretary, Norbert Elias Foundation Durban, South Africa, in mind, Robert and quoted − the three-line haiku (p. J.J. Viottastraat 13 van Krieken of the University of 59) which follows three longer poems 1071 JM Amsterdam Sydney has been exploring the possibil- in German under the general heading The Netherlands ity of our being promoted to the next, ‘Von der Tangerreise’ (From the Journey modestly higher, level in the ISA ladder to Tangiers). But now Richard Kilmin- In the case of books written in a lan- − what is called a ‘Thematic Group’, ster has turned up a longer version that guage other than English, French or and which at least is recognised as appeared in the journal Luciad, issue German, nominators are asked to pro- having a continuing existence. number 22, June 1962, published by the vide an outline in English of the content Students’ Union of the University of of the book. Robert has submitted the requisite Leicester. Here it appears under the title number of names of paid-up members ‘Marginal Notes to an introductory lec- of the ISA, but we have run into a ture in sociology’. The photocopy has a An ISA Thematic Group on problem. Faced with the title ‘Figura- couple of minor corrections in Norbert’s Civilising and Decivilising tional Sociology’, the ISA secretariat handwriting, which are incorporated Processes? has responded, ‘Yes, but what do you below. At the last three World Congresses of actually study?’. The ISA is largely Sociology − Bielefeld in 1994, Mon- organised around research into specific how strange these people are treal in 1998 and Brisbane in 2002 − factual topics, ranging from ‘Armed how strange I am there has been an ‘Ad Hoc Group’ in Forces and Society’ through ‘Stratifi- how strange we are Figurational Sociology. The success cation’ to ‘Sociology of Sport’. And of each of them − as reported in ear- indeed, the Congresses are largely when I was young lier issues of Figurations has testified organised on the assumption that mem- I thought women and men mysterious to the international interest in and the bers mainly attend meeting just of ‘their what games what smiles variety of research being pursued under own’ Research Committee, along with what whispers and what silences the rubric of ‘figurational sociology’. plenary and other special sessions. there seemed something hidden away Reading back through the reports, Much as we may deplore this intel- one could never understand one can see clear evidence of the way lectual Taylorism − the whole thrust of 2 Figurations Issue No.20 December 2003 Issue No.20 December 2003 Figurations 3 now that I am old et al. (1993) to explore the civilising Another way to introduce analysis the patterns of men have ceased to be effects of international regimes, and of the processes of pacification into strangers Jung’s (2001) synthesis of Marx, Weber IR is suggested by the work of the one learns to read and Elias to provide a framework for American IR scholar John Herz, who the signs of the eyes a global political sociology. Given the by all accounts possessed a ‘figura- the languages of lips many paths of the social turn, analysis tional imagination’ (Herz 1942, 1950, the signals of fingers and feet of the sociogenesis of international rela- 1957, 1967, 1978).
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  • Newsletter of the Norbert Elias Foundation
    45 Newsletter of the Norbert Elias Foundation FIGURATIONS NEWSLETTER HAS CONTENTS GONE DIGITAL Figurations Newsletter has gone digital 1 As most of you will have already noticed, our newsletter is now distributed electronically People 2 only. The Board of the Norbert Elias Foundation was reluctant to abandon printing, From the Norbert Elias Foundation 2 but in the end financial considerations won out: the cost will be reduced by four-fifths. Robert van Krieken’s YouTube lecture channel Starting with the current issue, subscribers will In the media 2 receive their copy by email, in the form of a PDF file. If you took the trouble to print it out Cooking for Elias 3 two-sided on buff paper, the newsletter will for the moment not look very different from the Figurational Journals online 3 printed version as it appeared from 1994 until now, although we can now use colour photos. Recent books and articles 5 Figurations 45 would normally have been sent Upcoming book publications 12 to you in July, but we have been in the throes of compiling a consolidated email circulation International Sociological Association news 12 list. As well as those on the postal address list, all subscribers to the Norbert Elias Foundation Forthcoming conferences 14 blog will receive this issue of Figurations automatically. If you wish to change your email address to which the newsletter is delivered, or wish to unsubscribe, please contact our Managing Editor, Barbara Górnicka, at [email protected]. It should be noted that all previous issues of Figurations have long been available as downloadable PDFs, at http://www.norberteliasfoundation.nl/ figurations.php.
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