While time may at first glance appear to be nothing but a natural given, it has in fact a long history as one of the most enigmatic and complex subjects of philosophical speculation, scientific scrutiny, and artistic representation but also political struggle. Time itself, in short, is far from timeless: it is rather culturally and historically specific as a construct and as an experiential category.
In our seminar we will concentrate on the aesthetics and politics of time in one particular historical moment of Western culture, namely modernism (ca. 1871-1945) – a period that is marked by exceptionally innovative experiments in the arts, in politics, and in philosophy, but that is also heavily tied in with the heyday of European colonialism, and with the emergence of fascism. Time, as we will see in our readings of classic modernist writings by Conrad, Woolf, Joyce and others, is crucially involved in all these developments.
- Kursleiter*in: Prof. Dr. Dirk Wiemann