Apocalyptic Angst

German Angst ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 290-330
Author(s):  
Frank Biess
Keyword(s):  
Driving Forces ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Emotional Expressiveness ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
Nuclear Movement ◽  
Environmental Threats ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
External Threats ◽  
Emotional Culture ◽  
History Of

This chapter analyzes the culmination of the history of fear in postwar West Germany during the 1980s. A culture of emotional expressiveness now merged with two new external threats: environmental disaster and a nuclear war. Apocalyptic fears served as the emotional driving forces of two new social movements: the environmental and the peace movements. The environmental movement did not emerge only as a result of new environmental threats but also derived from a changed emotional culture that increased individuals’ susceptibility to environmental threats. The chapter analyzes the emerging perception of a global ecological crisis, the anti-nuclear movement, and the debate over the dying forest in the 1980s. It then explains the emergence of the largest protest movement in the history of West Germany—the peace movement of the 1980s—as a result of a new culture of emotional expressiveness. Peace activists enacted this new emotional culture by publicly displaying and performing fear. The emergence of a popular Holocaust memory also enabled apocalyptic fears of, as it was called, a “nuclear Holocaust.”

A Reflection on Crucial Periods in 50 Years of Social Psychology (in Germany)

2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Katja Corcoran ◽  
Michael Häfner ◽  
Mathias Kauff ◽  
Stefan Stürmer
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Early Development ◽  
West Germany ◽  
East And West Germany ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
East And West

Abstract. In this article, we reflect on 50 years of the journal Social Psychology. We interviewed colleagues who have witnessed the history of the journal. Based on these interviews, we identified three crucial periods in Social Psychology’s history, that are (a) the early development and further professionalization of the journal, (b) the reunification of East and West Germany, and (c) the internationalization of the journal and its transformation from the Zeitschrift für Sozialpsychologie to Social Psychology. We end our reflection with a discussion of changes that occurred during these periods and their implication for the future of our field.

German Angst

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank Biess
Keyword(s):  
Federal Republic ◽  
National Socialism ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Peace Movements ◽  
Original Analysis ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Future ◽  
History Of ◽  
Fear And Anxiety ◽  
Relationship Of

German Angst analyzes the relationship of fear and democracy in postwar West Germany. While fear has historically been associated with authoritarian regimes, the book highlights the role of fear and anxiety in a democratizing society: these emotions undermined democracy and stabilized it at the same time. By taking seriously postwar Germans’ uncertainties about the future, the book challenges dominant linear and teleological narratives of postwar West German “success.” It highlights the prospective function of memories of war and defeat, of National Socialism and the Holocaust. Fears and anxieties derived from memories of a catastrophic past that postwar Germans projected into the future. Based on case studies from the 1940s to the present, the book provides a new interpretive synthesis of the Federal Republic. It tells the history of the Federal Republic as a series of recurring crises, in which specific fears and anxieties emerged, served a variety of political functions, and then again abated. Drawing on recent interdisciplinary insights of emotion studies, the book transcends the dichotomy of “reason” and “emotion.” Fear and anxiety were not exclusively irrational and dysfunctional but served important roles in postwar democracy. These emotions sensitized postwar Germans to the dangers of an authoritarian transformation, and they also served as the emotional engine of the environmental and peace movements. The book also provides an original analysis of the emotional basis of right-wing populism in Germany today, and it explores the possibilities of a democratic politics of emotion.

scholarly journals On Becoming a Non-Jewish Holocaust Writer: Yann Martel’s Beatrice and Virgil

Humanities ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 12
Author(s):  
Rachel F. Brenner
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Personal Life ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The World ◽  
Family Level ◽  
History Of ◽  
Religious Origins

To appraise Martel’s non-Jewish perspective of Holocaust thematic, it is important to assess it in the context of the Jewish relations with the Holocaust. Even though the Jewish claim to the uniqueness of the Holocaust has been disputed since the end of the war especially in Eastern Europe, the Jewish response determined to a large extent the reception of the disaster on the global scene. On a family level, the children of survivors have identified themselves as the legitimate heirs of the unknowable experience of their parents. On a collective level, the decree of Jewish annihilation constructed a Jewish identity that imposed an obligation to keep the Holocaust memory in the consciousness of the world. Martel proposes to supersede the history of the Holocaust with a story which would downplay the Jewish filiation with the Holocaust, elicit an affiliative response to the event of the non-Jewish writer and consequently integrate it into the memory of humanity at large. However, the Holocaust theme of Beatrice and Virgil refuses to assimilate within the general memory of humanity; rather, the consciousness of the event, which pervades the post-Holocaust world, insists on its constant presence. The omnipresence of the Holocaust blurs the distinctions between the filiative (Jewish) and affiliative (non-Jewish) attitudes toward the Jewish tragedy, gripping the writer in its transcendent horror. Disregarding his ethnic or religious origins, the Holocaust takes over the writer’s personal life and determines his story.

Rīgas humānistu motīvs Roalda Dobrovenska romānā „Magnus, dāņu princis”

2021 ◽  
pp. 172-180
Author(s):  
Ausma Cimdiņa
Keyword(s):  
Life Story ◽  
Driving Forces ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Human Society ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Nation States ◽  
Russian State ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Role

The novel “Magnus, the Danish Prince” by the Russian diaspora in Latvia writer Roald Dobrovensky is seen as a specific example of a biographical and historical genre, which embodies the historical experience of different eras and nations in the confrontation of globalisation and national self-determination. At the heart of the novel are the Livonian War and the historical role and human destiny of Magnus (1540–1683) – the Danish prince of the Oldenburg dynasty, the first and the only king of Livonia. The motif of Riga’s humanists is seen both as one of the main ideological driving forces of the novel and as a marginal reflection in Magnus’s life story. Acknowledged historical sources have been used in the creation of the novel: Baltazar Rusov’s “Livonian Chronicle”; Nikolai Karamzin’s “History of the Russian State”; Alexander Janov’s “Russia: 1462–1584. The Beginning of the Tragedy. Notes of the Nature and Formation of Russian Statehood” etc. In connection with the concept of Riga humanists, another fictitious document created by the writer Dobrovensky himself is especially important, namely, the diary of Johann Birke – Magnus’s interpreter, a person with a double identity, “half-Latvian”, “half-German”. It is a message of an alternative to the well-known historical documents, which allows to turn the Livonian historical narrative in the direction of “letocentrism” and raises the issue of the ethnic identity of Riga’s humanists. Along with the deconstruction of the historically documented image of Livonian King Magnus, the thematic structure of the novel is dominated by identity aspects related to the Livonian historical narrative. Dobrovensky, with his novel, raises an important question – what does the medieval Livonia, Europe’s common intellectual heritage, mean for contemporary Latvia and the human society at large? Dobrovensky’s work is also a significant challenge in strengthening emotional ties with Livonia (which were weakened in the early stages of national historiography due to conflicts over the founding of nation-states).

Modelling urban growth incorporating spatial interactions between the cities: The example of the Tehran metropolitan region

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (6) ◽  
pp. 1047-1064
Author(s):  
Sanaz Alaei Moghadam ◽  
Mohammad Karimi ◽  
Kyoumars Habibi
Keyword(s):  
Urban Growth ◽  
Satellite Images ◽  
Driving Forces ◽  
Strategic Decision ◽  
Metropolitan Region ◽  
Growth Modelling ◽  
Spatial Interactions ◽  
Metropolitan Regions ◽  
Central Business Districts ◽  
History Of

Interactions between cities play a significant role in the development of metropolitan regions. Although these interactions and their role in the urban growth modelling have already been investigated, there is still room for more studies. In this research, in addition to conventional urban growth factors, spatial interactions between the cities (SIBC) are incorporated into urban growth modelling. This causes directional trends in urban growth (DTUG). Therefore, first the DTUG of each city was measured using a developed indicator based on the history of urban growth that was extracted from satellite images and spatial statistics. The SIBC was then estimated by integrating the DTUG of the cities. Finally, the SIBC and other driving forces, including the physical suitability, accessibility and neighbourhood effects, were integrated using a cellular automata-based model. The accuracy of the model in the Tehran metropolitan region was increased by 6.44% after considering the SIBC. The analysis of the DTUG and SIBC in the Tehran metropolitan region during 1991–2000–2007–2014 revealed specific patterns as the spatial interactions intensified over time and usually peaked in the periphery of the central business districts and intense interactions existed between the metropolises and other major cities. These findings could help urban managers with strategic decision-making in the metropolitan regions and adjust the science and practice relation in this field.

scholarly journals The reconfiguration of the European Archive in contemporary German-Jewish migrant-literature

2017 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-54
Author(s):  
Jessica Ortner
Keyword(s):  
European Archive ◽  
Eastern European ◽  
History Writing ◽  
Migrant Literature ◽  
Holocaust Memory ◽  
Political Concern ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Mass Shooting ◽  
History Of ◽  
German Jewish

A considerable number of Eastern European migrant authors of Jewish origin are currently lifting Holocaust memory to a new level. Writing in German about events taking place in remote areas of the world, they expand the German framework of memory from a national to a transnational one. By partaking in reconsidering what is ‘vital for a shared remembering’ of Europe, this branch of writing reflects the European Union’s political concern for integrating the memories of the socialistic regimes in European history writing without relativising the Holocaust. In Vielleicht Esther, Katja Petrowskaja consults various national and private archives in order to recount the history of the mass shooting of over 30,000 Ukrainian Jews at Babij Jar – a canyon near Kiev. Thus, she ‘carries’ a marginalised event of the Holocaust into the German framework of memory and uncovers the layers of amnesia that have not only concealed the event amongst the Soviet public but also distorted and for ever made inaccessible her family’s past.

scholarly journals Gottfried Benn und die doppelte Staatsgründung 1949 – zu ausgewählten Prämissen seines schwierigen Verhältnisses zu Staat an sich und zum bundesdeutschen (Teil-)Staat

2017 ◽  
pp. 263-276
Author(s):  
Maciej Walkowiak
Keyword(s):  
Vital Role ◽  
The State ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Philosophy Of Art ◽  
Complex Relation ◽  
Gottfried Benn ◽  
Political Reality ◽  
History Of ◽  
The One ◽  
Literary Fame

The paper is mainly concerned with Gottfried Benn’s complex attitude to the state and history. By means of introductory prefigurations, such as existential tensions related to the conflict between Protestant ethics and modern aesthetics, there emerges Benn’s difficult and complex relation to the state as such, seen as a product of history, and to its particular examples, starting from the Second Reich until the initial phase of West Germany. Friedrich Nietzsche’s philosophy, and in particular the philosophy of art, is of great importance in this context. This issue is discussed using Benn’s key works such as Roman des Phänotyp or Doppelleben. Benn’s literary and life self-creations played a vital role in his relations with the political reality and the state, which is discussed at the end of this analysis. His ambivalent relation to early West Germany has a strong biographical basis, i.e. his involvement with the history of the Nazi Germany on the one hand, and on the other – the period of his literary fame at the end of his life.

scholarly journals Orędzie biskupów polskich w ocenie niemieckiego MSZ

2011 ◽  
pp. 73-91
Author(s):  
Piotr Madajczyk
Keyword(s):  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Alternative Methods ◽  
Political Climate ◽  
History Of

The history of the Polish Bishops’ Letter of Reconciliation to the German bishops, sent in the autumn of 1965, that is, in a very inopportune political climate, is now relatively well known and researched. What contributed to its being widespread, was the perception of it as a pre-cursor of the Polish-German reconciliation, an initiative which, while not capable of having a real impact on Poland and West Germany in the 60s, pointed to alternative methods by which it could be carried out and distanced itself from retaining hostility as a basis for Polish-German relations and using the stereotype of a threat on the part of Germany in Polish domestic politics. The circumstances in which the Letter had been brought into being could be studied thanks to the opening of Polish archives after the fall of Communism. The article shows how the Letter was received by West German diplomacy, in terms, most of all, of an appraisal of the chances and opportunities in the international arena which could follow from such a reception. What was important from Bonn’s point of view was the setting of the controversies around the Letter in Poland in a wider context, namely, one of balancing the relationships between determinants rooted in domestic politics, the policy of Moscow and the East Block and that of the Vatican.

scholarly journals Curtains Up! Shifting Emotional Styles in Gay Men's Venues Since the 1950s

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1–2) ◽  
pp. 57
Author(s):  
Benno Gammerl
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Variation ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Oral History ◽  
Affect Theory ◽  
West Germany ◽  
Male Homosexuality ◽  
Same Sex ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Oral History Interviews

This opinion piece enquires into the history of male homosexuality in West Germany since the 1950s and focuses on the transition from the homophile bar to the gay disco as a prototypical meeting place for same-sex desiring men. Which emotional shifts did this spatial variation entail? Based on oral history interviews and gay magazines, the analysis explores intricate changes in queer everyday life beyond the all too simple supposition that closeted shame was supplanted by openly gay pride. In addition, the study shows on a methodological level that the allegedly antagonistic approaches in emotion research – constructionism, praxeology, affect-theory and phenomenology – can actually be fruitfully combined with each other, especially when it comes to analysing the interplay between spaces and feelings.

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