Exile, Science and Bildung: The Contested Legacies of German Emigre Intellectuals

212 Pages·2005·2.359 MB·English

by  David Kettler, Gerhard Lauer (eds.)

Exile, Science, and BILDUNG
Studies in European Culture and History
edited by
Eric D. Weitz and Jack Zipes
University of Minnesota
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of communism, the very meaning of Europe has been
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with the rest of the world.
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Exile, Science, and BILDUNG
The Contested Legacies of German
Emigre Intellectuals
edited by
David Kettler
and
Gerhard Lauer
EXILE,SCIENCE,ANDBILDUNG
© David Kettler and Gerhard Lauer,2005.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2005 978-1-4039-6843-2
All rights reserved.No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any
manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief
quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
First published in 2005 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-73456-6 ISBN 978-1-137-04596-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-04596-6
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Exile,science,and Bildung :the contested legacies of German emigre
intellectuals / edited by David Kettler and Gerhard Lauer.
p.cm.—(Studies in European culture and history)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1.Germans—United States—History—20th century.2.Exiles—Germany.
3.United States—Intellectual life—20th century.4.Germany—Emigration and
immigration—History—20th century.5.Political refugees—United States.
6.Refugees,Jewish—United States.7.Brain drain—Germany—History—20th
century.8.Intellectuals—Germany—History—20th century.I.Kettler,David.
II.Lauer,Gerhard.III.Series.
E184.G3E89 2005
303.48(cid:2)273043(cid:2)0904—dc22 2005047204
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd.,Chennai,India.
First edition:October 2005
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
List of Illustrations vii
List of Contributors ix
Preface xi
1. The “Other Germany” and the
Question of Bildung: Weimar to Bonn 1
David Kettler and Gerhard Lauer
2. The Legacy of the George Circle 19
Ernst Osterkamp
3. Walter Benjamin’s “Secret Germany” 27
Irving Wohlfarth
4. A Humanist Program in Exile: Thomas Mann
in Philosophical Correspondence with His
Contemporaries 47
Reinhard Mehring
5. The Empire’s Watermark: Erich Kahler and Exile 63
Gerhard Lauer
6. An Exile’s Career from Budapest
through Weimar to Chicago: László Moholy-Nagy 75
Anna Wessely
7. Occult Encounters and “Structural
Misunderstandings” in Exile: The surrealists and the
Institut für Sozialforschungin the United States 101
Laurent Jeanpierre
8. The Davos Debate, Science, and the Violence
of Interpretation: Panofsky, Heidegger, and
Cassirer on the Politics of History 111
Gregory B. Moynahan
vi/ contents
9. Paul Oskar Kristeller, Ernst Cassirer, and the
“Humanistic Turn” in the American Emigration 125
Kay Schiller
10. “The Reparation of Dead Souls”—Siegfried
Kracauer’s Archimedean Exile—The Prophetic
Journey from Death to Bildung 139
Jerry Zaslove
11. Horkheimer, Adorno, and the Significance
of Anti-Semitism: The Exile Years 157
Jack Jacobs
12. Not-Such-Odd Couples: Paul Lazarsfeld and
the Horkheimer Circle on Morningside Heights 169
Thomas Wheatland
13. “Political Culturalism?” Adorno’s “Entrance”
in the Cultural Concert of West-German
Postwar History 185
Alfons Söllner
Index 201
List of Illustrations
6.1 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
September 1929 issue of die neue linie 87
6.2 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
December 1930 issue of die neue linie 91
6.3 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
May 1931 issue of die neue linie 92
6.4 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
December 1931 issue of die neue linie 93
6.5 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
October 1932 issue of die neue linie 94
6.6 László Moholy-Nagy: Front cover of the
May 1933 issue of die neue linie 95

List of Contributors
JACKJACOBS. Professor of Government, John Jay College and The Graduate Center,
City University of New York. Author: On Socialists and the “Jewish Question” after
Marx(1992). Editor: Jewish Politics in Eastern Europe: The Bund at 100(2001).
LAURENT JEANPIERRE. Sociology. SHADYC (École des hautes études en sciences
sociales, Marseille) / CEDITEC (Université Paris XII Val de Marne). Author: Articles
on New York intellectuals, French exiles, Varian Fry, Surrealism, and History of the
Social Sciences. Forthcoming book on the relationships between Surrealism and
Structuralism.
DAVIDKETTLER. Political Studies, Bard (Emeritus Trent University). Coauthor: Karl
Mannheim and the Crisis of Liberalism (1995), Social Regimes, Rule of Law and
Democratic Change (2001), and Karl Mannheim’s Sociology as Political Education
(2001).
GERHARD LAUER. Literature, University of Goettingen. Author: Die Verspätete
Revolution(1995) and coeditor of volumes on problems of social history and literature,
the return of the author.
REINHARDMEHRING. Institute of Philosophy, Humbold University, Berlin. Author:
Thomas Mann: Artist and Philosopher(2001); Introduction to Carl Schmitt(2001).
GREGORYMOYNAHAN. History. Bard College. Dissertation: “The Face of the Times:
Ernst Cassirer, Georg Simmel, and the Development of the Modern German Idea of
Culture.” Articles on Cassirer and Simmel.
ERNST OSTERKAMP. Literature. Humboldt University, Berlin. Author of numerous
books and articles on German literature, with special interest in boundary between
art and literature and the recent history of German “Bildung.”
KAY SCHILLER. Modern Europan History. University of Durham, U.K. Author:
Gelehrte Gegenwelten. Über humanistische Leitbilder im 20. Jahrhundert (2000) and
articles on German–Jewish emigre historians in the United States as well as German
history in the 1960s and 1970s.
ALFONSSÖLLNER. Political Theory. University of Chemnitz. Author, Peter Weiss und die
Deutschen. Die Entstehung einer politischen Ästhetik wider die Verdrängung (1988);
Deutsche Politkwissenschaftler in der Emigration. Ihre Akkulturation und Wirkungsgeschichte
(1996); as well as some fifty scholarly articles on the social science emigration/return.