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| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Fire Alarm Michael Lowy, 2016-10-04 This illuminating study of Benjamin’s final essay helps unlock the mystery of this great philosopher Revolutionary critic of the philosophy of progress, nostalgic of the past yet dreaming of the future, romantic partisan of materialism—Walter Benjamin is in every sense of the word an “unclassifiable” philosopher. His essay “On the Concept of History” was written in a state of urgency, as he attempted to escape the Gestapo in 1940, before finally committing suicide. In this scrupulous, clear and fascinating examination of this essay, Michael Löwy argues that it remains one of the most important philosophical and political writings of the twentieth century. Looking in detail at Benjamin’s celebrated but often mysterious text, and restoring the philosophical, theological and political context, Löwy highlights the complex relationship between redemption and revolution in Benjamin’s philosophy of history. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Theses On The Philosophy Of History Walter Benjamin, 2023 |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Illuminations Walter Benjamin, 1986 Walter Benjamin was one of the most original cultural critics of the twentieth century. Illuminations includes his views on Kafka, with whom he felt a close personal affinity; his studies on Baudelaire and Proust; and his essays on Leskov and on Brecht's Epic Theater. Also included are his penetrating study The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, an enlightening discussion of translation as a literary mode, and Benjamin's theses on the philosophy of history. Hannah Arendt selected the essays for this volume and introduces them with a classic essay about Benjamin's life in dark times. Also included is a new preface by Leon Wieseltier that explores Benjamin's continued relevance for our times. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Walter Benjamin and History Andrew Benjamin, 2005 The first book to examine in detail Benjamin's Theses on the Philosophy of History Benjamin's collection of fragments, Theses on the Philosophy of History, play a determining role in how Benjamin's thought is understood, as well as in the debate about the interplay between politics, history and time. Walter Benjamin and History is the first volume to give access to the themes and problems raised by the Theses, providing valuable exegetical and historical work on the text. The essays collected here are all the work of noted Benjamin scholars, and pursue the themes central to the Theses. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Words of Light Eduardo Cadava, 2018-06-05 Here Eduardo Cadava demonstrates that Walter Benjamin articulates his conception of history through the language of photography. Focusing on Benjamin's discussions of the flashes and images of history, he argues that the questions raised by this link between photography and history touch on issues that belong to the entire trajectory of his writings: the historical and political consequences of technology, the relation between reproduction and mimesis, images and history, remembering and forgetting, allegory and mourning, and visual and linguistic representation. The book establishes the photographic constellation of motifs and themes around which Benjamin organizes his texts and thereby becomes a lens through which we can begin to view his analysis of the convergence between the new technological media and a revolutionary concept of historical action and understanding. Written in the form of theses--what Cadava calls snapshots in prose--the book memorializes Benjamin's own thetic method of writing. It enacts a mode of conceiving history that is neither linear nor successive, but rather discontinuous--constructed from what Benjamin calls dialectical images. In this way, it not only suggests the essential rapport between the fragmentary form of Benjamin's writing and his effort to write a history of modernity but it also skillfully clarifies the relation between Benjamin and his contemporaries, the relation between fascism and aesthetic ideology. It gives us the most complete picture to date of Benjamin's reflections on history. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Angel of History Stéphane Mosès, 2009 In The Angel of History, Moses looks at three philosophersFranz Rosenzweig, Walter Benjamin, and Gershom Scholemwho formulated a new vision of history informed by Jewish messianism in 1920s Germany. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Fall of Language Alexander Stern, 2019-04-08 Known for his essays on culture, aesthetics, and literature, Walter Benjamin also wrote on the philosophy of language. For Alexander Stern, his famously obscure—and, for some, hopelessly mystical—early work contains important insights, anticipating and in some respects surpassing Wittgenstein’s later thinking on the philosophy of language. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Nietzsche’s Nihilism in Walter Benjamin Mauro Ponzi, 2016-11-21 This book reconstructs the lines of nihilism that Walter Benjamin took from Friedrich Nietzsche that define both his theory of art and the avant-garde, and his approach to political action. It retraces the eccentric route of Benjamin's philosophical discourse in the representation of the modern as a place of “permanent catastrophe”, where he attempts to overcome the Nietzschean nihilism through messianic hope. Using conventions from literary criticism this book explores the many sources of Benjamin's thought, demonstrating that behind the materialism which Benjamin incorporates into his Theses on the Concept of History is hidden Nietzsche's nihilism. Mauro Ponzi analyses how Benjamin’s Arcades Project uses figures such as Baudelaire, Marx, Aragon, Proust and Blanqui as allegories to explain many aspects of modernity. The author argues that Benjamin uses Baudelaire as a paradigm to emphasize the dark side of the modern era, offering us a key to the interpretation of communicative and cultural trends of today. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The British Marxist Historians Harvey J. Kaye, 2022-09-30 The British Marxist Historians remains the first and most complete study of the founders of one of the most influential contemporary academic traditions in history and social theory. In this classic text, Kaye looks at Maurice Dobb and the debate on the transition to capitalism; Rodney Hilton on feudalism and the English peasantry; Christopher Hill on the English Revolution; Eric Hobsbawm on workers, peasants and world history; and E.P. Thompson on the making of the English working class. Kaye compares their perspective on history with other approaches, such as that of the French Annales school, and concludes with a discussion of the British Marxist historians’ contribution to the formation of a democratic historical consciousness. The British Marxist Historians is an indispensable book for anyone interested in the intellectual history of the late twentieth century. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Moment Heidrun Friese, 2001-01-01 This volume addresses from different perspectives the key questions posed by the moment and thereby elucidates the connection between social theory, philosophy, literary theory and history that are opened by the moment. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Radio Benjamin Walter Benjamin, 2021-12-07 Walter Benjamin was fascinated by the impact of new technology on culture, an interest that extended beyond his renowned critical essays. From 1927 to ’33, he wrote and presented something in the region of eighty broadcasts using the new medium of radio. Radio Benjamin gathers the surviving transcripts, which appear here for the first time in English. This eclectic collection demonstrates the range of Benjamin’s thinking and his enthusiasm for popular sensibilities. His celebrated “Enlightenment for Children” youth programs, his plays, readings, book reviews, and fiction reveal Benjamin in a creative, rather than critical, mode. They flesh out ideas elucidated in his essays, some of which are also represented here, where they cover topics as varied as getting a raise and the history of natural disasters, subjects chosen for broad appeal and examined with passion and acuity. Delightful and incisive, this is Walter Benjamin channeling his sophisticated thinking to a wide audience, allowing us to benefit from a new voice for one of the twentieth century’s most respected thinkers. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: History and Freedom Theodor W. Adorno, 2014-11-05 Despite all of humanity's failures, futile efforts and wrong turnings in the past, Adorno did not let himself be persuaded that we are doomed to suffer a bleak future for ever. One of the factors that prevented him from identifying a definitive plan for the future course of history was his feelings of solidarity with the victims and losers. As for the future, the course of events was to remain open-ended; instead of finality, he remained committed to a Hölderlin-like openness. This trace of the messianic has what he called the colour of the concrete as opposed to mere abstract possibility. Early in the 1960s Adorno gave four courses of lectures on the road leading to Negative Dialectics, his magnum opus of 1966. The second of these was concerned with the topics of history and freedom. In terms of content, these lectures represented an early version of the chapters in Negative Dialectics devoted to Kant and Hegel. In formal terms, these were improvised lectures that permit us to glimpse a philosophical work in progress. The text published here gives us an overview of all the themes and motifs of Adorno's philosophy of history: the key notion of the domination of nature, his criticism of the existentialist concept of a historicity without history and, finally, his opposition to the traditional idea of truth as something permanent, unchanging and ahistorical. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Working with Walter Benjamin Andrew Benjamin, 2013-11-18 This book provides a highly original approach to the writings of the twentieth-century German philosopher Walter Benjamin by one of his most distinguished readers. It develops the idea of 'working with' Benjamin, seeking both to read his corpus and to put it to work - to show how a reading of Benjamin can open up issues that may not themselves be immediately at stake in his texts. The defining elements in Benjamin's writings that Andrew Benjamin isolates - history, experience, translation, technical reproducibility and politics - are put to work; that is, their utility is established in engaging the works of others. The question is how utility is understood. As Andrew Benjamin argues, utility involves demonstrating the different ways in which Benjamin is a central thinker within the project of understanding the nature of modernity. This is best achieved by noting connections and points of differentiation between his work and the writings of Adorno and Heidegger. However, the more demanding project is that 'working with' Benjamin necessitates deploying the implicit assumptions within his writings as well as demanding of his formulations more than is provided by their initial presentation. What is at stake is not the application of Benjamin's thought. Rather what counts is its use.Working with Benjamin engages with the themes central to Benjamin's work with deftness, daring and critical insight while at the same time situating those themes within current academic and cultural debates. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Walter Benjamin Howard Caygill, 2005-07-25 This book analyses the development of Benjamin's concept of experience in his early writings showing that it emerges from an engagement with visual experience, and in particular the experience of colour. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Selected Writings: 1938-1940 Walter Benjamin, 1996 Comprising more than 65 pieces - journal articles, reviews, extended essays, sketches, aphorisms, and fragments - this volume shows the range of Walter Benjamin's writing. His topics here include poetry, fiction, drama, history, religion, love, violence, morality and mythology. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Benjamin Files Fredric Jameson, 2022-03-22 Jameson’s first full-length engagement with Walter Benjamin’s work. The Benjamin Files offers a comprehensive new reading of all of Benjamin's major works and a great number of his shorter book reviews, notes and letters. Its premise is that Benjamin was an anti-philosophical, anti-systematic thinker whose conceptual interests also felt the gravitational pull of his vocation as a writer. What resulted was a coexistence or variety of language fields and thematic codes which overlapped and often seemed to contradict each other: a view which will allow us to clarify the much-debated tension in his works between the mystical or theological side of Benjamin and his political or historical inclination. The three-way tug of war over his heritage between adherents of his friends Scholem, Adorno and Brecht, can also be better grasped from this position, which gives the Brechtian standpoint more due than most influential academic studies. Benjamin’s corpus is an anticipation of contemporary theory in the priority it gives language and representation over philosophical or conceptual unity; and its political motivations are clarified by attention to the omnipresence of History throughout his writing, from the shortest articles to the most ambitious projects. His explicit program—“to transfer the crisis into the heart of language” or, in other words, to detect class struggle at work in the most minute literary phenomena—requires the reader to translate the linguistic or representational literary issues that concerned him back into the omnipresent but often only implicitly political ones. But the latter are those of another era, to which we must gain access, to use one of Benjamin’s favorite expressions. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Promise of Memory Matthias Fritsch, 2012-02-01 Rereading Marx through Walter Benjamin and Jacques Derrida, The Promise of Memory attempts to establish a philosophy of liberation. Matthias Fritsch explores how memories of injustice relate to the promises of justice that democratic societies have inherited from the Enlightenment. Focusing on the Marxist promise for a classless society, since it contains a political promise whose institutionalization led to totalitarian outcomes, Fritsch argues that both memories and promises, if taken by themselves, are one-sided and potentially justify violence if they do not reflect on the implicit relation between them. He examines Benjamin's reinterpretation of Marxism after the disappointment of the Russian and German revolutions and Derrida's messianic inheritance of Marx after the breakdown of the Soviet Union. The book also contributes to contemporary political philosophy by relating Marxist social goals and German critical theory to debates about deconstructive ethics and politics. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Walter Benjamin's Philosophy Andrew Benjamin, Peter Osborne, 2013-09-05 This collection explores, in Adorno's description, `philosophy directed against philosophy'. The essays cover all aspects of Benjamin's writings, from his early work in the philosophy of art and language, through to the concept of history. The experience of time and the destruction of false continuity are identified as the key themes in Benjamin's understanding of history. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Berlin Childhood Around 1900 Walter Benjamin, 2006 Begun in Poveromo, Italy, in 1932, and extensively revised in 1938, Berlin Childhood around 1900 remained unpublished during Walter Benjamin's lifetime, one of his large-scale defeats. Now translated into English for the first time in book form, on the basis of the recently discovered final version that contains the author's own arrangement of a suite of luminous vignettes, it can be more widely appreciated as one of the masterpieces of twentieth-century prose writing. Not an autobiography in the customary sense, Benjamin's recollection of his childhood in an upper-middle-class Jewish home in Berlin's West End at the turn of the century becomes an occasion for unified expeditions into the depths of memory. In this diagram of his life, Benjamin focuses not on persons or events but on places and things, all seen from the perspective of a child--a collector, flâneur, and allegorist in one. This book is also one of Benjamin's great city texts, bringing to life the cocoon of his childhood--the parks, streets, schoolrooms, and interiors of an emerging metropolis. It reads the city as palimpsest and labyrinth, revealing unexpected lyricism in the heart of the familiar. As an added gem, a preface by Howard Eiland discusses the genesis and structure of the work, which marks the culmination of Benjamin's attempt to do philosophy concretely. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Suffering Time: Philosophical, Kabbalistic, and Ḥasidic Reflections on Temporality Elliot R. Wolfson, 2021-05-25 No one theory of time is pursued in these essays, but a major theme that threads them together is Wolfson’s signature idea of the timeswerve as a linear circularity or a circular linearity, expressions that are meant to avoid the conventional split between the two temporal modalities of the line and the circle. The conception of time elicited by Wolfson from a host of philosophical and mystical sources—both Jewish and non-Jewish—buttresses the contention that it is precisely structural invariability that engenders interpretive variation. This hermeneutical axiom is justified, in turn, by the presumption regarding the cadence of time as the constant return of what has always been what is yet to be. The telling of time wells forth from the time of telling. One cannot speak of the being of time, consequently, except from the standpoint of the time of being, nor of the time of being except from the standpoint of the being of time. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Critical Theory and Society Stephen Eric Bronner, Douglas Kellner, 1989 First Published in 1990. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Revolution and History in Walter Benjamin Alison Ross, 2020-09-30 This book places Benjamin's writing on revolution in the context of his conception of historical knowledge. The fundamental problem that faces any analysis of Benjamin's approach to revolution is that he deploys notions that belong to the domain of individual experience. His theory of modernity with its emphasis on the disintegration of collective experience further aggravates the problem. Benjamin himself understood the problem of revolution to be primarily that of the conceptualization of collective experience (its possibility and sites) under the conditions of modern bourgeois society. The novelty of his approach to revolution lies in the fact that he directly connects it with historical experience. Benjamin's conception of revolution thus constitutes an integral part of his distinctive theory of historical knowledge, which is also essentially a theory of experience. Through a detailed study of Benjamin's writings on the topics of the child and the dream, and an analysis of his ideas of history, the fulfilled wish, similitude and communist society, this book shows how the conceptual analysis of his corpus can get to the heart of Benjamin's conception of revolutionary experience and distil its difficulties and mechanisms. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: How to Critique Authoritarian Populism , 2021-02-15 How to Critique Authoritarian Populism: Methodologies of the Frankfurt School offers a comprehensive introduction to the techniques used by the early Frankfurt School to study and combat authoritarianism and authoritarian populism. In recent years there has been a resurgence of interest in the writings of the early Frankfurt School, at the same time as authoritarian populist movements are resurging in Europe and the Americas. This volume shows why and how Frankfurt School methodologies can and should be used to address the rise of authoritarianism today. Critical theory scholars are assembled from a variety of disciplines to discuss Frankfurt School approaches to dialectical philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, human subjects research, discourse analysis and media studies. Contributors include: Robert J. Antonio, Stefanie Baumann, Christopher Craig Brittain, Dustin J. Byrd, Mariana Caldas Pinto Ferreira, Panayota Gounari, Peter-Erwin Jansen, Imaculada Kangussu, Douglas Kellner, Dan Krier, Lauren Langman, Claudia Leeb, Gregory Joseph Menillo, Jeremiah Morelock, Felipe Ziotti Narita, Michael R. Ott, Charles Reitz, Avery Schatz, Rudolf J. Siebert, William M. Sipling, David Norman Smith, Daniel Sullivan, and AK Thompson. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Walter Benjamin Richard Wolin, 2023-09-01 Few twentieth-century thinkers have proven as influential as Walter Benjamin, the German-Jewish philosopher and cultural and literary critic. Richard Wolin's book remains among the clearest and most insightful introductions to Benjamin's writings, offering a philosophically rich exposition of his complex relationship to Adorno, Brecht, Jewish Messianism, and Western Marxism. Wolin provides nuanced interpretations of Benjamin's widely studied writings on Baudelaire, historiography, and art in the age of mechanical reproduction. In a new Introduction written especially for this edition, Wolin discusses the unfinished Arcades Project, as well as recent tendencies in the reception of Benjamin's work and the relevance of his ideas to contemporary debates about modernity and postmodernity. Few twentieth-century thinkers have proven as influential as Walter Benjamin, the German-Jewish philosopher and cultural and literary critic. Richard Wolin's book remains among the clearest and most insightful introductions to Benjamin's writings, offerin |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity Jurgen Habermas, 1990-03-14 This critique of French philosophy and the history of German philosophy is a tour de force that has the immediacy and accessibility of the lecture form and the excitement of an encounter across national cultural boundaries as Habermas takes up the challenge posed by the radical critique of reason in contemporary French postmodernism. The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity is a tour de force that has the immediacy and accessibility of the lecture form and the excitement of an encounter across, national cultural boundaries. Habermas takes up the challenge posed by the radical critique of reason in contemporary French poststructuralism. Tracing the odyssey of the philosophical discourse of modernity, Habermas's strategy is to return to those historical crossroads at which Hegel and the Young Hegelians, Nietzsche and Heidegger made the fateful decisions that led to this outcome. His aim is to identify and clearly mark out a road indicated but not taken: the determinate negation of subject-centered reason through the concept of communicative rationality. As The Theory of Communicative Action served to place this concept within the history of social theory, these lectures locate it within the history of philosophy. Habermas examines the odyssey of the philosophical discourse of modernity from Hegel through the present and tests his own ideas about the appropriate form of a postmodern discourse through dialogs with a broad range of past and present critics and theorists. The lectures on Georges Bataille, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, and Cornelius Castoriadis are of particular note since they are the first fruits of the recent cross-fertilization between French and German thought. Habermas's dialogue with Foucault—begun in person as the first of these lectures were delivered in Paris in 1983 culminates here in two appreciative yet intensely argumentative lectures. His discussion of the literary-theoretical reception of Derrida in America—launched at Cornell in 1984—issues here in a long excursus on the genre distinction between philosophy and literature. The lectures were reworked for the final time in seminars at Boston College and first published in Germany in the fall of 1985. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Body-and Image-Space Sigrid Weigel, 2003-12-16 The last decade has seen a new wave of interest in philosophical and theoretical circles in the writings of Walter Benjamin. In Body-and Image-Space Sigrid Weigel, one of Germany's leading feminist theorists and a renowned commentator on the work of Walter Benjamin, argues that the reception of his work has so far overlooked a crucial aspect of his thought - his use of images. Weigel shows that it is precisely his practice of thinking in images that holds the key to understanding the full complexity, richness and topicality of Benjamin's theory. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Habermas and the Unfinished Project of Modernity Maurizio Passerin d'Entrèves, Seyla Benhabib, 1997 Modernity versus postmodernity / Jurgen Habermas-- The discourse of modernity / Fred Dallmayr-- Deconstruction, postmodernism and philosophy / Christopher Norris-- Splitting the difference / David C. Hoy-- Habermas and Foucault / James Schmidt-- Intersubjectivity and the monadic core of the psyche / Joel Whitebook-- Two versions of the linguistic turn / James Bohman-- Habermas and the question of alterity / Diana Coole-- The causality of fate / Jay M. Bernstein-- The subject of justice in postmodern discourse / David Ingram. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: End of History and the Last Man Francis Fukuyama, 2006-03-01 Ever since its first publication in 1992, the New York Times bestselling The End of History and the Last Man has provoked controversy and debate. Profoundly realistic and important...supremely timely and cogent...the first book to fully fathom the depth and range of the changes now sweeping through the world. —The Washington Post Book World Francis Fukuyama's prescient analysis of religious fundamentalism, politics, scientific progress, ethical codes, and war is as essential for a world fighting fundamentalist terrorists as it was for the end of the Cold War. Now updated with a new afterword, The End of History and the Last Man is a modern classic. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Arcades Project Walter Benjamin, 1999 Focusing on the arcades of 19th-century Paris--glass-roofed rows of shops that were early centers of consumerism--Benjamin presents a montage of quotations from, and reflections on, hundreds of published sources. 46 illustrations. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Hegel's Rabble Frank Ruda, 2011-10-06 A concise but comprehensive student guide to studying Emily Bronte's classic novel Wuthering Heights. It covers adaptations such as film and TV versions of the novel and student-friendly features include discussion points and a comprehensive guide to further reading. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Nomadic Theory Rosi Braidotti, 2012-02-07 Rosi Braidotti's nomadic theory outlines a sustainable modern subjectivity as one in flux, never opposed to a dominant hierarchy yet intrinsically other, always in the process of becoming, and perpetually engaged in dynamic power relations both creative and restrictive. Nomadic theory offers an original and powerful alternative for scholars working in cultural and social criticism and has, over the past decade, crept into continental philosophy, queer theory, and feminist, postcolonial, techno-science, media, and race studies, as well as into architecture, history, and anthropology. This collection provides a core introduction to Braidotti's nomadic theory and its innovative formulations, which playfully engage with Deleuze, Foucault, Irigaray, and a host of political and cultural issues. Arranged thematically, essays begin with such concepts as sexual difference and embodied subjectivity and follow with explorations in technoscience, feminism, postsecular citizenship, and the politics of affirmation. Braidotti develops a distinctly positive critical theory that rejuvenates the experience of political scholarship. Inspired yet not confined by Deleuzian vitalism, with its commitment to the ontology of flows, networks, and dynamic transformations, she emphasizes affects, imagination, and creativity and the politics of radical immanence. Incorporating ideas from Nietzsche and Spinoza as well, Braidotti establishes a critical-theoretical framework equal parts critique and creation. Ever mindful of the perils of defining difference in terms of denigration and the related tendency to subordinate sexualized, racialized, and naturalized others, she explores the eco-philosophical implications of nomadic theory, feminism, and the irreducibility of sexual difference and sexuality. Her dialogue with technoscience is crucial to nomadic theory, which deterritorializes the established understanding of what counts as human, along with our relationship to animals, the environment, and changing notions of materialism. Keeping her distance from the near-obsessive focus on vulnerability, trauma, and melancholia in contemporary political thought, Braidotti promotes a politics of affirmation that has the potential to become its own generative life force. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Walter Benjamin's Other History Beatrice Hanssen, 2000-12-04 In this study, Beatrice Hanssen unlocks the philosophical and ethical dimensions of the Trauerspiel study, showing how its thematics persisted well into the later writings of the thirties. For by introducing the materialistic category of natural history in The Origin of German Tragic Drama, Benjamin not only criticized idealistic conceptions of history writing but also expressed an ethico-theological call for another kind of history, one no longer anthropocentric in nature. This profound critique of historical thinking, Hanssen shows, went hand in hand with a radical de-limitation of the human subject, informed by his interest in questions about ethics, the law, and justice. Through an analysis of the seemingly innocuous figures of stones, animals, and angels that are scattered throughout his writings, Hanssen reconstructs the often neglected ethical dimension of his historical thought. In the course of doing so, she not only places Benjamin's work in the context of contemporaries such as Adorno, Cohen, Lukacs, Kafka, Kraus, and Heidegger but also demonstrates the persistence of Benjaminian themes in contemporary philosophy and critical theory. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Kairós Giacomo Marramao, 2007 |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: On Creaturely Life Eric L. Santer, 2009-06-24 In his Duino Elegies, Rainer Maria Rilke suggests that animals enjoy direct access to a realm of being—the open—concealed from humans by the workings of consciousness and self-consciousness. In his own reading of Rilke, Martin Heidegger reclaims the open as the proper domain of human existence but suggests that human life remains haunted by vestiges of an animal-like relation to its surroundings. Walter Benjamin, in turn, was to show that such vestiges—what Eric Santner calls the creaturely—have a biopolitical aspect: they are linked to the processes that inscribe life in the realm of power and authority. Santner traces this theme of creaturely life from its poetic and philosophical beginnings in the first half of the twentieth century to the writings of the enigmatic German novelist W. G. Sebald. Sebald’s entire oeuvre, Santner argues, can be seen as an archive of creaturely life. For Sebald, the work on such an archive was inseparable from his understanding of what it means to engage ethically with another person’s history and pain, an engagement that transforms us from indifferent individuals into neighbors. An indispensable book for students of Sebald, On Creaturely Life is also a significant contribution to critical theory. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Disenchantment of Art Rainer Rochlitz, 1998-02-15 Fifty years after his death, Walter Benjamin remains one of the great cultural critics of this century. Despite his renown, however, Benjamin's philosophical ideas remain elusive--often considered a disaggregated set of thoughts not meant to cohere. This book provides a more systematic perspective on Benjamin, laying claim to his status as a philosopher and situating his work in the context of its time. Exploring Benjamin's theory of language, spoken and nonspoken, Rainer Rochlitz shows how Benjamin reconceptualized traditional ideas of language, art, and history. Offering an expansive assessment of a unique twentieth-century thinker, this volume provides an indispensable guide for readers of Benjamin's recently released collected works. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Iron Council China Miéville, 2008-08-28 Rebellion and war collide in Iron Council, the award-winning steampunk novel from acclaimed author China Miéville. New Crobuzon is being ripped apart from without and within. War with the shadowy city-state of Tesh and rioting on the streets at home are pushing this teeming metropolis to the brink. In the midst of the city's turmoil, a mysterious masked figure spurs an unconventional rebellion, while a small band of daring rebels escapes in the search for a lost legend. As New Crobuzon faces its darkest hour, there are whispers. It is the time of the Iron Council. . . Set in a desperate world on the brink of revolution, Iron Council is the third book in China Miéville's renowned Bas-Lag series, following the Locus and Arthur C. Clarke award-winning Perdido Street Station and The Scar. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Perdido Street Station China Miéville, 2003-07-29 WINNER OF THE AUGUST DERLETH AND ARTHUR C. CLARKE AWARDS • A masterpiece brimming with scientific splendor, magical intrigue, and fierce characters, from the author who “has reshaped modern fantasy” (The Washington Post) “[China Miéville’s] fantasy novels, including a trilogy set in and around the magical city-state of New Crobuzon, have the refreshing effect of making Middle-earth seem plodding and flat.”—The New York Times The metropolis of New Crobuzon sprawls at the center of the world. Humans and mutants and arcane races brood in the gloom beneath its chimneys, where the river is sluggish with unnatural effluent and foundries pound into the night. For a thousand years, the Parliament and its brutal militias have ruled over a vast economy of workers and artists, spies and soldiers, magicians, crooks, and junkies. Now a stranger has arrived, with a pocketful of gold and an impossible demand. And something unthinkable is released. The city is gripped by an alien terror. The fate of millions lies with a clutch of renegades. A reckoning is due at the city’s heart, in the vast edifice of brick and wood and steel under the vaults of Perdido Street Station. It is too late to escape. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: Now-time Image-space Kia Lindroos, 1998 Lindroos constructs an alternative interpretation on history, time, politics and art, approached through the moment of the Now (Jetztzeit). In the first section, she elaborates the critique of chronologic-linear way of understanding history. Through a close reading of Benjamin's Work of Art essay, the second section examines the problems of origins, authenticity and traditions of art through the ideas of artistic avant-garde and politicization of aesthetics. The end of the book discusses the concept of image and the new images as an Image-Space (Bildraum) of action. |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: A Companion to the Philosophy of History and Historiography Aviezer Tucker, 2009-02-17 The fifty entries in this Companion cover the main issues in the philosophies of historiography and history, including natural history and the practices of historians. Written by an international and multi-disciplinary group of experts A cutting-edge updated picture of current research in the field Part of the renowned Blackwell Companions series |
| benjamin theses on the philosophy of history: The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction Walter Benjamin, 2023-03-02 Walter Benjamin discusses whether art is diminished by the modern culture of mass replication, arriving at the conclusion that the aura or soul of an artwork is indeed removed by duplication. In an essay critical of modern fashion and manufacture, Benjamin decries how new technology affects art. The notion of fine arts is threatened by an absence of scarcity; an affair which diminishes the authenticity and essence of the artist's work. Though the process of art replication dates to classical antiquity, only the modern era allows for a mass quantity of prints or mass production. Given that the unique aura of an artist's work, and the reaction it provokes in those who see it, is diminished, Benjamin posits that artwork is much more political in significance. The style of modern propaganda, of the use of art for the purpose of generating raw emotion or arousing belief, is likely to become more prevalent versus the old-fashioned production of simpler beauty or meaning in a cultural or religious context. |
Theses on the Philosophy of History Walter Benjamin I …
Theses on the Philosophy of History Walter Benjamin I The story is told of an automaton constructed in such a way that it could play a winning game of chess, answering each move of …
Walter Benjamin
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Theseson the Philosophy of History - Archive.org
The only writer of history with the gift of setting alight the sparks of hope in the past, is the one who is convinced of this: that not even the dead will be safe from the enemy, if he is victorious.
Walter Benjamin's Philosophy of History
Benjamin seeks to explain how one can be both a historian and a historical materialist, without defining or justifying the activity of historiography in terms of the immediate needs of …
Concept History Benjamin - Simon Fraser University
‘The truth will not run away from us’: in the historical outlook of historicism these words of Gott-fried Keller mark the exact point where historical materialism cuts through historicism. For …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
thought is most evident Some of the essays analyze Benjamin s writings in cultural history and the philosophy of history Others connect his historical and theoretical practices to issues in …
Walter Benjamin. On the Concept of History. Gesammelten …
Through a system of mirrors, the illusion was created that this table was transparent from all sides. In truth, a hunchbacked dwarf who was a master chess-player sat inside, controlling the …
Theses On The Philosophy Of History Benjamin (Download …
Philosophy of History Benjamin s collection of fragments Theses on the Philosophy of History play a determining role in how Benjamin s thought is understood as well as in the debate about the …
Theses On The Philosophy Of History - oldshop.whitney.org
collection of fragments Theses on the Philosophy of History play a determining role in how Benjamin s thought is understood as well as in the debate about the interplay between politics …
WALTER BENJAMIN AND HISTORY - api.pageplace.de
implications of Benjamin’s extended writings on history. Rather than concentrate simply on the so-called ‘Theses on the Philosophy of History’ (now known, following the title in the Selected …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History (book)
How do Benjamin's Theses relate to current social justice movements? Benjamin's emphasis on the voices of the marginalized and the importance of collective memory deeply resonates with …
Walter Benjamin On the Concept of History Click here for
One can imagine a philosophical counterpart to this device. The puppet called ‘historical materialism’ is to win all the time. It can easily be a match for anyone if it enlists the services of …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History , Walter …
Philosophy of History Benjamin's collection of fragments, Theses on the Philosophy of History, play a determining role in how Benjamin's thought is understood, as well as in the debate …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
Age of Mechanical Reproduction, an enlightening discussion of translation as a literary mode, and Benjamin's theses on the philosophy of history. Hannah Arendt selected the essays for this …
Walter Benjamin's Angel of History, or the Transfiguration of …
In the spring of 1989, six months before the Berlin Wall was breached, West German professor of history, Lutz Niethammer, was writing yet other commentary on Walter Benjamin's ninth thesis …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
Philosophy of History Benjamin's collection of fragments, Theses on the Philosophy of History, play a determining role in how Benjamin's thought is understood, as well as in the debate …
Walter Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History (book)
Benjamin and History is the first volume to give access to the themes and problems raised by the Theses providing valuable exegetical and historical work on the text The essays collected here …
Walter Benjamin and the Angel of History
In the "Theses on the Philosophy of History," written after his release from the internment camp in France and just before his suicide, Benjamin wrote perhaps his most poignant allegory about …
Theses on the Philosophy of History Walter Benjamin I …
Theses on the Philosophy of History Walter Benjamin I The story is told of an automaton constructed in such a way that it could play a winning game of chess, answering each move of …
Walter Benjamin
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Theseson the Philosophy of History - Archive.org
The only writer of history with the gift of setting alight the sparks of hope in the past, is the one who is convinced of this: that not even the dead will be safe from the enemy, if he is victorious.
Walter Benjamin's Philosophy of History
Benjamin seeks to explain how one can be both a historian and a historical materialist, without defining or justifying the activity of historiography in terms of the immediate needs of …
Concept History Benjamin - Simon Fraser University
‘The truth will not run away from us’: in the historical outlook of historicism these words of Gott-fried Keller mark the exact point where historical materialism cuts through historicism. For …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
thought is most evident Some of the essays analyze Benjamin s writings in cultural history and the philosophy of history Others connect his historical and theoretical practices to issues in …
Walter Benjamin. On the Concept of History. Gesammelten …
Through a system of mirrors, the illusion was created that this table was transparent from all sides. In truth, a hunchbacked dwarf who was a master chess-player sat inside, controlling the …
Theses On The Philosophy Of History Benjamin (Download …
Philosophy of History Benjamin s collection of fragments Theses on the Philosophy of History play a determining role in how Benjamin s thought is understood as well as in the debate about the …
Theses On The Philosophy Of History - oldshop.whitney.org
collection of fragments Theses on the Philosophy of History play a determining role in how Benjamin s thought is understood as well as in the debate about the interplay between politics …
WALTER BENJAMIN AND HISTORY - api.pageplace.de
implications of Benjamin’s extended writings on history. Rather than concentrate simply on the so-called ‘Theses on the Philosophy of History’ (now known, following the title in the Selected …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History (book)
How do Benjamin's Theses relate to current social justice movements? Benjamin's emphasis on the voices of the marginalized and the importance of collective memory deeply resonates with …
Walter Benjamin On the Concept of History Click here for
One can imagine a philosophical counterpart to this device. The puppet called ‘historical materialism’ is to win all the time. It can easily be a match for anyone if it enlists the services of …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History , Walter …
Philosophy of History Benjamin's collection of fragments, Theses on the Philosophy of History, play a determining role in how Benjamin's thought is understood, as well as in the debate …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
Age of Mechanical Reproduction, an enlightening discussion of translation as a literary mode, and Benjamin's theses on the philosophy of history. Hannah Arendt selected the essays for this …
Walter Benjamin's Angel of History, or the Transfiguration of …
In the spring of 1989, six months before the Berlin Wall was breached, West German professor of history, Lutz Niethammer, was writing yet other commentary on Walter Benjamin's ninth thesis …
Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History
Philosophy of History Benjamin's collection of fragments, Theses on the Philosophy of History, play a determining role in how Benjamin's thought is understood, as well as in the debate …
Walter Benjamin Theses On The Philosophy Of History (book)
Benjamin and History is the first volume to give access to the themes and problems raised by the Theses providing valuable exegetical and historical work on the text The essays collected here …
Walter Benjamin and the Angel of History
In the "Theses on the Philosophy of History," written after his release from the internment camp in France and just before his suicide, Benjamin wrote perhaps his most poignant allegory about …
