The Aesthetics of Politics: Walter Benjamin's "Theories of German Fascism"

Hillach, Ansgar; Wikoff, Jerold; Zimmerman, Ulf

doi:10.2307/488012

Cited by 57 publications

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“…As the translators of the 2012 English edition explain, Benjamin was ‘inspired by the volume’ claiming ‘to have been unable to “read more than two or three pages at a time, for my heartbeat became so strong that I was forced to lay the book down”’ (Bures and Neaman, 2012: xvii–xviii). Even Benjamin, who opposed Jünger’s politics and aesthetics of war, found his vision resonated (Hillach et al, 1979). These indirect connections to Benjamin alone justify recognition of Jünger as a contributor to analyses of profound boredom.…”

Section: Boredom and Danger In The Work Of Ernst Jüngermentioning

confidence: 99%

Boredom at work: The contribution of Ernst Jünger

Watt

Weibull

2022

Organization

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This paper interrogates the phenomenon of boredom at work by considering Ernst Jünger’s potential contribution. We contend that Jünger offers an important yet overlooked alternative to the dominant perspectives of boredom in Management and Organization Studies (MOS), which are largely composed of ‘simple’ psychological diagnoses and managerial prescriptions. Such studies largely understand boredom as a localised experience at work which can be overcome by targeted managerial prescriptions, techniques and interventions. In contrast we show how Jünger understands boredom from a ‘profound’ perspective as a central feature of modernity. This is premised on Jünger’s broader critique of the bourgeois values that define 20th and 21st century managerial work and organization. Jünger’s cultural-historical perspective is therefore aligned to the discrete field of Boredom Studies. By addressing how Jünger understands ‘work’ as the defining feature of the modern age, his critique situates the phenomenon of boredom at work within the broader social, institutional and cultural order of the 21st Century. While Jünger does not set out to provide a theory of boredom as such, we reconstruct such a theory through an exegesis of his writing on ‘work’ and ‘danger’. This reveals boredom and danger as phenomenologically intertwined concepts, which is an understanding of boredom that has not been considered in MOS or Boredom Studies. It is through this, we argue, that Jünger’s conception of work holds the potential for a powerful critique and understanding of boredom at work under the contemporary regime of neoliberal managerialism.

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Section: Boredom and Danger In The Work Of Ernst Jüngermentioning

confidence: 99%

Boredom at work: The contribution of Ernst Jünger

Watt

Weibull

2022

Organization

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“…Walter Benjamin saw the aestheticization of politics as a logical outcome of the Fascist/National Socialist strategy to give the masses a grandiose expressive aim (radical nationalism and total war), which would deflect their energies from attacking the structure of capitalist exploitation (Benjamin; Hillach, Wikoff and Zimmerman). In their pessimistic analysis of the cultural industries (written in Los Angeles in the late 1930s and early 1940s), Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno, leading figures of the Frankfurt Schule , generalized this critique to encompass the modern cult of celebrity and pseudo‐individuality in post‐fascist liberal democracies, with the United States leading the way.…”

Section: The Ambiguous Heritage Of Aesthetic Politicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Celebrity Culture, Performative Politics, and the Spectacle of “Democracy” in America

Elteren¹

2013

J of American Culture

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“…3 Para una interpretación del texto de Benjamin "Theorien des deutschen Faschismus", dedicado a comentar críticamente la mencionada antología de Jünger, véase Hillach (1979). 4 Véase el "Manifiesto futurista" (Le Figarò, 20 de febrero de 1909, en: http://www.artemotore.com/futurismo.html).…”

Section: Distintas Facetas De La Estetización De La Política: El Ejemplo Del Nazismounclassified

“…¿El modelo de una identidad, y al mismo tiempo su actual ejecución? Tal es la potencia tautegórica 14 del mito que el Gesamtkunstwerk nazi expresó del modo más completo. Ciertamente no ficción o simple imagen, sino autopoiesis de una comunidad hecha inmanente a sí misma por la autoidentificación con la propia esencia común (Esposito 1996, 109).…”

Section: De La Estetización De La Política a La Comunidad Desobradaunclassified

From an Aesthetization of Politics to the “Inoperative” Community

Acosta

Quintana

2010

rev. estud. soc.

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Este artículo se propone mostrar que la idea de una estetización de la política no se reduce a la extrapolación de criterios estéticos al ámbito de lo político y, consiguientemente, que el reto por pensar una política no estetizada puede traer consigo propuestas más radicales que aquellas que se sugieren, por ejemplo, con la idea de una "politización del arte". Siguiendo a J. L. Nancy, Lacoue-Labarthe y R. Esposito, se planteará que una política estetizada apunta a la producción de lo político como obra de arte, y que esta idea ha predominado en la tradición occidental toda vez que la comunidad se ha pensado como obra, como hacer de la subjetividad o como sujeto colectivo que se realiza en su esencia. El ensayo termina concluyendo, entonces, que la interrupción de una política estetizada requiere una reflexión renovada sobre el ser-en-común de los seres humanos, desde una apertura a su finitud y a su radical alteridad.

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The Aesthetics of Politics: Walter Benjamin's "Theories of German Fascism"

Cited by 57 publications

References 0 publications

Boredom at work: The contribution of Ernst Jünger

Boredom at work: The contribution of Ernst Jünger

Celebrity Culture, Performative Politics, and the Spectacle of “Democracy” in America

From an Aesthetization of Politics to the “Inoperative” Community

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