Sommersemester 2020
German Studies
Prof. Dr. Elisabeth Décultot
The Invention of Landscape. Nature in Text and Image, 1750-1850 (Lecture)
As an object of experience and as an aesthetic construct, the landscape advanced with the 18th and 19th century to a central category of modernity. Landscape painting, which in the academic theories of the Early Modern period had been considered an inferior genre, is declared the quintessence of modernity at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. In literature a new interest for descriptions of landscapes became apparent, which would soon result in theoretical reflection on the concept of landscape: What exactly constitutes the experience of landscape? Can landscape exist apart from the eye of the beholder? What distinguishes landscape from nature? In this lecture course, we will analyze the manifold answers to this question provided between 1750 and 1850 by literary authors (in particular Herder, Lessing, Goethe, Tieck, Novalis, August Wilhelm und Friedrich Schlegel) as well as from philosophers (Schelling) and painters (Philipp Otto Runge, Carl Gustav Carus and Caspar David Friedrich).
Genius. Transformations of a Fundamental Concept of the 18th Century (Seminar)
The term "genius" (Genie) can be regarded as an invention of the second half of the 18th century. To be sure, a host of German authors, among them Leibniz, Wolff, Gottsched, Bodmer, Breitinger, and Baumgarten, had previously thematized the notion of genius in isolated instances and thereby made recourse to various German, French, and Latin terms (including "ingenium," "genius," "Witz" and "génie"). However, a discussion that seized the entire range of the arts (especially literature, painting, and music) first developed with authors like Sulzer, Herder, and Goethe: Is genius an innate or learned property? Is it universal or reserved only for particular human beings? Is a genius distinguished by extraordinary rational capacities or rather by an unusual sensitive faculty? The aim of this seminar is to follow this discussion throughout the 18th century and thereby illuminate the genesis of a fundamental concept of modernity.
Classic. On the Genesis and Actuality of a Fundamental Concept of Literary Studies (Seminar)
By the predicate "classic" one usually understands the epoch which – considered throughout Europe – extends from the 17th century to the beginning of the 19th century, thus from the French "classicisme" to the "Weimarer Klassik" and – among others, in the course of the excavations in Herculaneum (from 1738) and in Pompei (1763) – is informed by a vigorous interest for ancient culture. The art-theoretical views which arose in this period and which were encapsulated by the category of "classical" are in fact distinguished by a striking heterogeneity. This holds both for the issue of imitation of nature and for those issues concerning the exemplary status of antiquity in matters of art. The aim of this seminar is to analyze the manifold conceptual determinations connected with the term "classic" and to thereby challenge the genesis and actuality of a fundamental concept of literary studies.
Prof. Dr. Daniel Fulda
Information available soon.
History
Prof. Dr. Yvonne Kleinmann
Big Data in the Empire. How the Russian Empire Generated and Politically Utilized Knowledge about its Population (18th Century to 1917)
Scholarship has engaged intensely with the question how and for what reasons the Russian Empire (just like other empires) broke up. Recently some scholars have also investigated which factors contributed to Russia having had more than 200 years of continued existence. As of yet the question of how the imperial administration collected data on the socially, ethnically and religiously heterogenous population in the face of constant territorial expansion and political unrest has hardly been investigated. In short: How did the empire learn about itself? And what followed from this? The lecture course illuminates these questions from an epistemic-historical perspective, that is, knowledge is not regarded as a fixed existence but as something that is selectively composed, communicated and utilized by particular agents. Thus, we are especially interested in who collected data on various population groups for the administration of the Russian Empire – bureaucrats, scientists, local elites, etc. – who had access to this data and how this was utilized in politics. Such data comprises various sources: travel records, expedition reports, state surveys, ethnographical studies, expert opinions, etc.
Research Colloquium. Eastern European History
Prof. Dr. Andreas Pečar
No courses offered this semester
Prof. Dr. Patrick Wagner
Unfree Work in Pre-modernity and Modernity (Seminar)
Three primary narratives revolve around unfree work. First, it is claimed that in earlier societies work was "unfree" in the forms of slavery or serfdom, but in modern capialist societies it rests on the freedom of the workers. Out of this there arises a narrative on emancipation through modernizing forces such as Protestantism, Enlightenment, markets, and democracy. Second, against this one could point out the violent nature of work relations especially in modernity, such as in colocnial contexts. Third, on the one hand, groups and institutions which profited from unfree work invented diverse legitimations (such as economic, religious or other notions of "natural" inequality of human beings), on the other hand, groups that denied certain forms of unfree work formulate similarly diverse counterarguments. Against this background, this seminar shall investigage the respective functional logics of unfree work as well as the processes which contributed to its transformation, modernization, and – partly – to its abolishment. In doing so, we will concentrate on four examples: the Middle European serfdom of the Early Modern period, the American plantation slavery, the confinement of the poor and unemployed in closed institutions of the 19th and 20th centuries and in many societies of the "third world" until institutions of debt servitude continuing today.
Philosophy
Prof. Dr. Heiner Klemme
No courses offered this semester
Dr. John Walsh
Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (Seminar)
The "Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals" is one of the primary texts of Immanuel Kant's practical philosophy as well as one of the most imporant ethical works in the history of philosophy. In this work Kant presents crucial concepts such as autonomy, duty, obligation, etc. These concepts and Kant's development of the foundation of a deontological system of ethics is also of systematic significance. The aim of this seminar is to facilitate an historical and systematic understanding of the fundamental concepts and main arguments of the text.
Theology
Prof. Dr. Jörg Dierken
Jürgen Habermas: Belief and Knowledge (Seminar)
Jörgen Habermas, whose 90th Birthday was recently celebrated with widespread media response, is the most internationally influential German philosopher of today. Keywords like "communicative action," "discourse ethics," and "post-metaphysical thinking" are examplary of his thought. After the young Habermas advanced the thesis that the "captivating power of the sacred" had been converted into the "binding power of reasons," the older Habermas saw in religion important potential for resistance in the face of a "derailed" modernity.