Ute Frevert

سياسة الإذلال

In a brilliant procession through the last 250 years, Ute Frevert looks at the role that public humiliation has played in modern society, showing how humiliation - and the feeling of shame that it engenders - has been used as a means of coercion and control, from the worlds of politics and international diplomacy through to the education of children and the administration of justice. We learn the stories of the French women whose hair was compulsorily shaven as a punishment for alleged relations with German soldiers during the occupation of France, and of the transgressors in the USA who are made to carry a sign announcing their presence when walking down busy streets. Bringing the story right up to the present, we see how the internet and social media pillorying have made public shaming a ubiquitous phenomenon. Using a multitude of both historical and contemporary examples, Ute Frevert shows how humiliation has been used as a tool over the last 250 years (and how it still is today), a story that reveals remarkable similarities across different times and places. And we see how the art of humiliation is in no way a thing of the past but has been re-invented for the 21st century, in a world where such humiliation is inflicted not from above by the political powers that be but by our social peers.

A Modern History

The Politics of Humiliation

Schauplätze von Macht und Ohnmacht

Die Politik der Demütigung

Der Mensch des 20. Jahrhunderts

Heinz-Gerhard Haupt

13 Beiträge von Historikerinnen und Historikern zur Übergangszeit von der Romantik zur Moderne: die Gesellschaft muss sich rasch auf die fundamentalen Neuerungen der Industrialisierung einstellen. Thema der Beiträge sind die Menschen hinter diesen Entwicklungen: das Dienstmädchen, die Grossstadtmenschen, der Migrant, der Arzt, die Arbeiterin, der Unternehmer, der Künstler, der Ingenieur, die Gläubige.

Der Mensch des 19. Jahrhunderts

Philipp Nielsen

Juliane Brauer

Michael Amico

Hannah Malone

Kerstin Maria Pahl

Francesco Buscemi

Agnes Arndt

Karsten Lichau

Julia Wambach

Caroline Moine

Historicizing both emotions and politics, this open access book argues that the historical work of emotion is most clearly understood in terms of the dynamics of institutionalization. This is shown in twelve case studies that focus on decisive moments in European and US history from 1800 until today. Each case study clarifies how emotions were central to people’s political engagement and its effects. The sources range from parliamentary buildings and social movements, to images and speeches of presidents, from fascist cemeteries to the International Criminal Court. Both the timeframe and the geographical focus have been chosen to highlight the increasingly participatory character of nineteenth- and twentieth-century politics, which is inconceivable without the work of emotions.

Emotions and Institutions since 1789

Feeling Political

Benno Gammerl

Pascal Eitler

Monique Scheer

Bettina Hitzer

Margrit Pernau

Nina Verheyen

Christian Bailey

Anne Schmidt

Emotions are as old as humankind. But what do we know about them and what importance do we assign to them? Emotional Lexicons is the first cultural history of terms of emotion found in German, French, and English language encyclopaedias since the late seventeenth century. Insofar as these reference works formulated normative concepts, they documented shifts in the way the educated middle classes were taught to conceptualise emotion by a literary medium targeted specifically to them. As well as providing a record of changing language use (and the surrounding debates), many encyclopaedia articles went further than simply providing basic knowledge; they also presented a moral vision to their readers and guidelines for behaviour. Implicitly or explicitly, they participated in fundamental discussions on human nature: Are emotions in the mind or in the body? Can we "read" another person's feelings in their face? Do animals have feelings? Are men less emotional than women? Are there differences between the emotions of children and adults? Can emotions be "civilised"? Can they make us sick? Do groups feel together? Do our emotions connect us with others or create distance? The answers to these questions are historically contingent, showing that emotional knowledge was and still is closely linked to the social, cultural, and political structures of modern societies. Emotional Lexicons analyses European discourses in science, as well as in broader society, about affects, passions, sentiments, and emotions. It does not presume to refine our understanding of what emotions actually are, but rather to present the spectrum of knowledge about emotion embodied in concepts whose meanings shift through time, in order to enrich our own concept of emotion and to lend nuances to the interdisciplinary conversation about them.

Continuity and Change in the Vocabulary of Feeling 1700-2000

Emotional Lexicons

Coming to terms with emotions and how they influence human behaviour, seems to be of the utmost importance to societies that are obsessed with everything “neuro.” On the other hand, emotions have become an object of constant individual and social manipulation since “emotional intelligence” emerged as a buzzword of our times. Reflecting on this burgeoning interest in human emotions makes one think of how this interest developed and what fuelled it. From a historian’s point of view, it can be traced back to classical antiquity. But it has undergone shifts and changes which can in turn shed light on social concepts of the self and its relation to other human beings (and nature). The volume focuses on the historicity of emotions and explores the processes that brought them to the fore of public interest and debate.

Emotions in History – Lost and Found

Günter Stock

Ernst Osterkamp

The volume examines the lives and achievements of women who played determining roles in the history of European academies and in the development of modern science in Europe. These persevering personalities either had a key influence in the establishment of academies ("Patronae Scientiarum") or were pioneering scientists who made major contributions to the progress of science ("path-breakers"). In both cases, their stories provide unique testimonies on the scientific institutions of their time and the systemic barriers female scientists were facing. Conceptualized as a transversal series of biographical portraits, the contributions focus particularly on each personalities’ role in (or relation to) European academies, ensuring both a geographical and disciplinary balance. The co-editors of the volume are Professor Ute Frevert (Co-Director at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development), Professor Ernst Osterkamp (President of the Deutsche Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung) and Professor Günter Stock (former ALLEA President).

From Patronae Scientiarum to Path-Breakers

Women in European Academies

Coming to terms with emotions and how they influence human behaviour, seems to be of the utmost importance to societies that are obsessed with everything "neuro." On the other hand, emotions have become an object of constant individual and social manipulation since "emotional intelligence" emerged as a buzzword of our times. Reflecting on this burgeoning interest in human emotions makes one think of how this interest developed and what fuelled it. From a historian's point of view, it can be traced back to classical antiquity. But it has undergone shifts and changes which can in turn shed light on social concepts of the self and its relation to other human beings (and nature). The volume focuses on the historicity of emotions and explores the processes that brought them to the fore of public interest and debate.

Jan Plamper

Uffa Jensen

Stephanie Olsen

Anja Laukötter

Daniel Brückenhaus

Magdalena Beljan

Joachim C. Häberlen

Learning How to Feel explores the ways in which children and adolescents learn not just how to express emotions that are thought to be pre-existing, but actually how to feel. The volume assumes that the embryonic ability to feel unfolds through a complex dialogue with the social and cultural environment and specifically through reading material. The fundamental formation takes place in childhood and youth. A multi-authored historical monograph, Learning How to Feel uses children's literature and advice manuals to access the training practices and learning processes for a wide range of emotions in the modern age, circa 1870-1970. The study takes an international approach, covering a broad array of social, cultural, and political milieus in Britain, Germany, India, Russia, France, Canada, and the United States. Learning How to Feel places multidirectional learning processes at the centre of the discussion, through the concept of practical knowledge. The book innovatively draws a framework for broad historical change during the course of the period. Emotional interaction between adult and child gave way to a focus on emotional interactions among children, while gender categories became less distinct. Children were increasingly taught to take responsibility for their own emotional development, to find 'authenticity' for themselves. In the context of changing social, political, cultural, and gender agendas, the building of nations, subjects and citizens, and the forging of moral and religious values, Learning How to Feel demonstrates how children were provided with emotional learning tools through their reading matter to navigate their emotional lives.

Children's Literature and Emotional Socialization, 1870-1970

Learning How to Feel

Akademische Lebenslaufe erzahlen uns ebenso viel uber die Person wie uber ihr Fach und dessen Geschichte. Ute Frevert gab der Sozial- und Geschlechtergeschichte durch richtungsweisende Publikationen wichtige Impulse. Schon fruh hat sie dabei auch die geschichtsbildende Kraft einzelner Gefuhle herausgearbeitet und in ihrer historischen Gebundenheit verortet. Heute gilt die Historikerin hierzulande, aber auch weit uber die deutschen Sprachgrenzen hinaus, als die einflussreichste Vertreterin einer neuen Forschungsrichtung: der Geschichte der Gefuhle in der Moderne. Dieser Band vereint 22 Texte: programmatische Aufsatze, die den Weg bahnten, anregende Einzelstudien und bislang unveroffentlichte Vortrage, die den Reiz und den Wert der Emotionsgeschichte belegen. In einem preisgekronten sprachlichen Stil, gleichermaaen elegant wie prazise, prasentiert die Auswahl eine sorgsam komponierte Synthese aus drei Jahrzehnten, die von der Macht der Gefuhle in der Geschichte zeugt.

Gefuhle in Der Geschichte

In diesem ersten, programmatischen Band der Reihe werden die Konturen einer neuen Politikgeschichte entworfen. Ihr Gegenstand sind die historisch variablen Grenzziehungen zwischen dem Politischen und dem Nichtpolitischen. Diese sich wandelnden Konstruktionen des Politischen untersuchen die Autorinnen und Autoren des Bandes in verschiedenen empirischen Studien. Thematisch reicht deren Spektrum von Huldigungen an die preußischen Könige über Debatten um Altersgrenzen im Wahlrecht der Weimarer Republik bis zur Politisierung des Mediums Film im Stalinismus und dem Verhältnis von Politik und Religion in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland.

Perspektiven einer historischen Politikforschung

Neue Politikgeschichte

Children's Literature and the History of Emotional Socialization, 1870-1970

Ute Frevert

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