AMEUR · Anthropological Materialism: a Neglected European Tradition
FP7 — People (Marie Curie Actions)
- Duration
- 2010-09-01 → 2012-08-31
- EU contribution
- €154,461
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MC-IEF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Anthropological materialism: a neglected European tradition
Project objectives The researcher aimed principally to circumscribe 'anthropological materialism' as a neglected part of European identity, from the 19th to the 21th century, from the perspective of Walter Benjamin, and to build an international team around this theme. The goal was simultaneously to retrace the history of this concept in Walter Benjamin's writings, to show the actuality of such a concept with new analyses through the method it generates, and to build an international scholar interest around such a project. Works performed The main results of the researchers are the 7 following ones: (1) The written of the book Phantasmagorias of the Capital, that will be published in the winter of 2012 by La Découverte (Collection Zones). It is an attempt of using anthropological materialism for the analysis of certain modern and postmodern urban spaces from the 20th and 21th centuries: the Palais Royal and the Arcades in Paris, the first World Exhibition (London, 1851), Haussmann's Paris (around 1870), Disneyland (1955), the Mall of America (1992), and Las Vegas (from the 1970's to the 1990's). (2) The creation of an international team interested in anthropological materialism (by the help of the results listed below). (3) The editing of the website http://www.anthropologicalmaterialism.hypotheses.org (4) The organisation of 5 international events: (a) a workshop on anthropological materialism (University of Potsdam); (b) a workshop on Walter Benjamin and Technique (MSH Paris); (c) a conference on Berlin's Phantasmagorias (University of Potsdam); (d) an exhibition on Berlin's Phantasmagorias (Berlin); (e) (in collaboration with Dr Thomas Ebke) a French-German summer school on 'Anthropological and Aleatoric Materialism' at the University of Potsdam (DFH / University of Paris IV / University of Potsdam), with one day in the art gallery KW Institute for Contemporary Art (Berlin) and a film screening in the Kino Babylon (Berlin), in presence of the film-director. (5) 12 presentations and lectures in international conferences, congresses, but also cultural centres and museums in Buenos Aires, Santiago, Paris, St Andrews, Rom, London and Berlin. (6) 12 posts, articles and book contributions: (a) 4 posts on www.anthropologicalmaterialism.hypotheses.org: - Walter Benjamin et le cinéma, 16 January 2012, - 'Explosions', ou le matérialisme anthropologique de Charles Fourier, 21 February 2011, - Seven Short Statements on Anthropological Materialism, 15 November 2010, - 8 Thesis on Phantasmagoria, 6 September 2010. (b) 2 book contributions: (i) 'How would Benjamin Have Written the Arcades Book? As a Ragpicker. Baudelaire's Example', M. Vatter (ed.), Walter Benjamin: Convergences of Aesthetics and Political Theology, Santiago, Lom, 2012 (forthcoming). - 'La Barcelone de Gaudi, une utopie architecturale. La sociologie de l'utopie de Benjamin', M. A. Duran, J. P. Santiago et F. Laplantine (dir.), Utopies, enchantements et hybridités dans la ville ibérique et latino-américaine, Paris, Editions des Archives Contemporaines, 2012, p. 183-190. (c) 6 peer-reviewed articles: - 'Against the Collège de Sociologie, and beyond. The 'Negative Anthropological' Dimension of the Frankfurt School', in Peter Osborne (ed.), Kingston, 2013. - 'Par-delà fantasme et idéologie. La résolution 'fantasmagorique' des conflits sociaux', in Illusio no 10-11. Crises, Ecole de Francfort et Théorie critique, Editions du Croquant, Paris, 2013. - 'Kitsch ou double? Mickey, Filmed Dream of Hilarious Collective', Eggs Laid by Tigers. Dada and Beyond Vol. 2, E. Adamowicz (ed.) in Avantgarde Critical Studies 27, Amsterdam, Rodopi, 2013. - 'Flâneur contre chiffonnier. Constructions et positions de la Passagenarbeit', Archives de Philosophie no 75, 2012, p. 425-447. - With Martin BALOGE, Yoan BOGET and Elissa MAILÄNDER, Introduction to 'Conflits et conflictualités', Trajectoires no 5, 2011: http://trajectoires.revues.org. - 'Walter Benjamin et la question des masses', Contretemps no 10, Paris, Syllepse, June 2011, p. 121-125. (7) The editing of the journal Anthropology + Materialism. A Journal for Social Research, submitted to www.revues.org for an online access. Main results achieved so far The main results achieved so far are: (1) the actualisation of anthropological materialism in the book untitled Phantasmagorias of the Capital; (2) the creation of an international team around anthropological materialism, particularly with the help of the up-to-date website (see http://www.anthropologicalmaterialism.hypotheses.org online for further details) and through the organisation of different international events, given over to large public and specialists; (3) the dissemination of the project through virtual medias, articles in journal and books, and presentations in academic and cultural places. Following final results are: (1) The forthcoming journal Anthropology + Materialism. A Journal for Social Research, at the crossroad of anthropological materialism and materialist anthropology, which will be submitted to www.revues.org in the winter of 2012. (2) The forthcoming book Understanding Benjamin which, introducing Walter Benjamin through anthropological materialism, will be submitted in the spring of 2013.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
The purpose of the project “Anthropological Materialism: a Neglected European Tradition” (AMEUR) is, from the perspective of Walter Benjamin, to circumscribe “anthropological materialism” as a neglected part of European identity, from the 19th to the 21th century. The task is double. On the one hand, it is to build the concept of “anthropological materialism” as a world vision that, explicitly and implicitly, theoretically and concretely, in French and in German cultures, played an essential role in Europe during the 19th Century. On the other hand, the task is to actualize the concept of “anthropological materialism” for political sociology, philosophical anthropology and modern history, i.e., in a multidisciplinary manner, in order to understand Europe in the 20th and 21th centuries. The candidate will work on the manuscripts in the Benjamin Archives, on the sources of German anthropological materialism, and he will compare them to the French counterparts. He will write a synthetic presentation, with representative extracts, from French sources and German sources, in order to present the theoretical movement of anthropological materialism as a European movement in the 19th Century, its influence on the social and political movements in Europe in the 19th century, and its actualization on Europe in the 20th and in the 21th century. The project looks at a hidden tradition of Europe since the origin of its modernity. It opens up a new perspective on Europe, elevating the tradition of anthropological materialism to the level of a methodological paradigm in order to reveal the obscure mechanisms of the construction of Europe. It gives new insights into the others “materialisms”. It also produces relevant knowledge about the construction of European tradition. The quality of this project is thus determined by the disclosure of a disregarded tradition of Europe that may significantly influence its future.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITAET POTSDAM · PotsdamCoordinatorGermany
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union