Le ragazze della Bauhaus

This essay was inspired by Mark Jones’ monograph Founding Weimar. Violence and the German Revolution of 1918–1919 (2016). The first section of the essay highlights the relevance of this book for historical research on the revolution of 1918/19. Its second section discusses relevant reviews of the monograph. The third and fourth sections focus on how different political movements, as well as the views of historians on the revolution of 1918/19, have changed within the past hundred years. Nowadays, critical historical research on the revolution has to focus on new questions. Since the outbreak of the present global economic crisis, the capitalist order has been in question. Alternative left-wing economic orders as they were developed by the German Ratebewegung (worker’s council movement) in 1918/19 should be discussed from a new perspective. Due to the global economic crisis, right-wing movements have gained more influence over the last decade. Parliamentary democracies are progressively eroding. Jones’ book is in contrast to the current academic discourse. This last can be considered to be in crisis, as it displays a limited understanding of the revolution of 1918/19 by merely regarding it as part of the success story of the Weimar Republic. Jones highlights the escalation of violence and the role proto-fascist Freikorps played as the initiators of this escalation. He also considers the political responsibility of the Social Democratic Party. Jones concludes that counter-revolutionary violence caused the founding as well the end of the Weimar Republic.

Since the 1970s, feminist and LGBT scholarship has extensively focused on the impact that advertising, television and film have on the standardization and objectification of the female and lesbian body. However, little attention has been given to the images produced in global(izing) communication industries such as branding and stock photography. Brands and stock photographs alike may seem to be more invisible, although and perhaps because they are in fact much more pervasive than “traditional” media images. These images originate from major centers of post-industrial capitalist power and are used and consumed by multiple actors, ranging from communication professionals to ordinary consumers. In this article, I offer an in-depth critical reading of some key communication resources of two global corporations: the global coffeehouse chain Starbucks and the world-leading provider of stock photography Getty Images. First, I examine some of the key branding strategies used by Starbucks, with a specific focus on the deployment of the female body in the mermaid logo. Second, I examine Getty photographs aimed at representing lesbian subjectivities for a variety of uses. The differences that set us apart, or the eccentricities of our bodies, are increasingly exploited in globalizing contexts that require differentiation and distinction, though within the rigid structures that underlie the economic, political and cultural marketplaces of contemporaneity. For this reason, in my analysis I also and foremost focus on the visual treatment of key “abject” or “queer” features that characterize images produced both by Starbucks and Getty. In this way, I ultimately highlight some of the dynamics that underlie the coding of differences, rather than the homogenization of discursive practices in contemporary communication. Keywords: lesbian, female body, queer, abjection, stylization, Starbucks, Getty, branding, stock photography, visual communication, globalization.

This paper examines the direct democratic institutions within the German political system. In a first step, direct democratic elements are analyzed in a historical context covering a period from the Weimar Republic to and beyond German Reunification. In a second step, the direct democratic instruments provided in the Basic Law and the various state constitutions are analyzed in their respective legal context whereby the focus lies on the Lander level. Finally, the main points of criticism of the current state of direct democracy in Germany and their remedies are to be outlined. The historical analysis shows that the 'Weimar experience' contrary to commonly held beliefs cannot provide the reason for not implementing direct democratic elements in the Basic Law after World War II. The comparative legal examination of the Lander constitutions identifies three institutional types of direct democracy: a two-tier-model, a three-tier-model and a hybrid model which are presented in detail. The criticism of the current state of direct democracy in Germany concerns formal, material, and procedural requirements and restrictions that have to be met in order to make a referendum succeed. The signature quorums are comparatively high and therefore are in danger to exert a prohibitive effect. Moreover, the approval and participation quorums required by some constitutions might undermine one key contribution of direct democracy: the political discussion. The requirement of a reasoned and detailed draft bill - if interpreted too narrowly - may ask too much of laymen. The more or less comprehensive preclusion of budget-affecting issues virtually excludes any referendums. The parliament's right to submit a counter-proposal might be misused as a means of splitting of votes, in particular where the voter is allowed to cast only a single yes-vote.

This article seeks to correct the assumption that Lifelong Learning was only invented by educationists in the 1970s. In contrast to the numerous authors who regard E. Faure's 1972 book Learning to Be as the origin of lifelong learning, I refer back to Cyril O. Houle and his remarkable publication of 1961, ”The Inquiring Mind”, as the father of lifelong learning in a modern sense. Houle suggested that the roots of lifelong learning lay in ancient Judaism. The article follows this notion and provides the main stages of this argument: ancient Judaism existed primarily as a learning community, lifelong learning is demonstrated repeatedly in the Torah and Talmud, the Haskalah serves as the link with educational practice in Germany, and finally the function of the ”houses of teaching” (Lehrhauser) in the Weimar Republic (Buber, Rosenzweig, & Simon) as places of lifelong learning in both its religious and its secular sense.

This study deals with left-wing splinter parties which were in existence in Germany between 1918 and 1933. In 1918 the Second Empire collapsed, the Kaiser abdicated, and the imperial government resigned. Only the socialists were relatively strong enough and, in the eyes of the public and the victorious Allies, unblemished enough to take command of the state. At this historical moment, however, the socialists were divided. The chance to install socialism in Germany was lost due to the bitter fighting among the three principal left-wing parties. The divisions in the socialist camp, which had started earlier, but which broke into open warfare at the end of the Great War, were intensified by the crises the Weimar Republic faced and led to a great number of splinter parties. Chapter One provides the background. It concentrates on some of the problems that the SPD and the KPD faced before Hitler's take-over. Chapter Two discusses the emergence of splinter groups. It traces each splinter group from its origin inside a larger party, its evolution,aand its decline. The Third Chapter examines the programs, platforms, and ideologies of the splinter parties. It concentrates on their political and economic demands. It also deals with their views on fascism and the methods they adopted to cope with the menace presented by the rise of Hitler's NSDAP. The Fourth Chapter is devoted to structure and organization. The parliamentary as well as the non parliamentary activities of the splinter parties are discussed. It examines their involvement in organizations like the trade unions and affiliated youth groups. Some of the major publications of the splinter parties are listed here. The Conclusion assesses the reasons for the failure of the splinter parties. Splinter parties were both, symptoms and victims of the turbulent times of the Weimar Republic. They were not the cause of Hitler's victory. Their importance lies not in the Impact they had on Weimar, but in what they show about Weimar Germany. They reflected in a microscopic way the insecurity, the mistrust, the social decay, the social and political mobility and unrest, the countless crises, and the blind and desperate search for something better.

Like many of us, this book originated in chance and accident rather than forethought and planning. Not long after the Wende, the coming down of the Wall, I happened to be in Berlin, and, as I wandered through the newly open city, it struck me (as it doubtless struck many others at that time) that after some sixty years — roughly the span of my own lifetime — Berlin had returned to a state it had not known since the Nazis came to power. This brought to mind the group of English writers who had, briefly or not so briefly, made Berlin their home in the last years of the Weimar Republic, and I wondered idly how much in a merely material sense had survived two generations of destruction and rebuilding, partition and reunification: how far the physical fabric of the Berlin that Wystan Auden, Christopher Isherwood, Stephen Spender and others had lived in and written about could be, historically or sentimentally, recovered or rediscovered.

The Architecture of Co-operation investigates the relationship between the collective subject and urban form through co-operation as means of production. The point is how individuals can organize co-operation today for the city as a project and what could be the role of architects into this process. Thus, the aim of the thesis is first to attempt to provide scientific evidence for the production of architecture through co-operation, highlighting possible potentials as well as pitfalls. And second, is to question whether (and if so how) co-operation can turn into a conscious project to organize the relationship between individuals and urban form. From a grammar of the concept of Human Nature the definition of co-operation adopted is a human nature evolution factor to survive the struggle against adverse circumstances. It is influenced by the contingent material factors proper to each age, but also grounded in biological invariants that human beings own as species for survival. A close reading of the work of three architects and their projects can provide a genealogy of the Architecture of Co-operation: H. Meyer with his co-op architecture for the mass society of the Weimar Republic, E. Mari and the Gruppo N promoters of emancipation through self-design in the ‘60s and ’70s in Italy, and C. Price with his concept of anticipatory and enabling architecture in the advent of Anglo-Saxon neoliberalism. This genealogy seeks after a problematization of co-operation taking distance from “participation”, the main threads of research analyse the relationship subject - object/ individual - urban form, the question of authorship and the role of the architect, and how to foster self – valorization, organization and creativity of the collective subject through architecture.

This chapter narrates and analyses the major public celebrations of international solidarity in Germany with a focus on Berlin as the scene of the celebration. In the first part, the focus of the analysis will be on the Arbeiterhilfe’s International Solidarity Days (1930–1932) that involved tens of thousands of people which, especially towards the end of the Weimar Republic, became the most important international solidarity festival.

Popper in the Weimar era (1919–1933)

ČlĂĄnek se zabĂ˝vĂĄ Schmittovou kritikou modernity a jejĂ­mi antisemitskĂ˝mi přesahy, a to na pozadĂ­ zpĹŻsobu, jimĹž Schmitt konstruoval centrĂĄlnĂ­ pojem svĂŠ teorie politična  nepřítele. Koncept nepřítele se tak v Schmittově dĂ­le postupně vyvĂ­jĂ­. V předvĂ˝marskĂŠm obdobĂ­, v němĹž vznikajĂ­ předevĹĄĂ­m vĂ˝znamnĂŠ texty Der Wert des Staates und die Bedeutung des Einzelnen a Theodor Däublers "Nordlicht", je nepřítelem předevĹĄĂ­m modernĂ­, individualistickĂ˝ člověk či modernĂ­ duch. V obdobĂ­ vĂ˝marskĂŠm se pak z nepřítele stĂĄvĂĄ jiĹž nepřítel politična, kterĂŠho Schmitt bohuĹžel a velmi odpudivĂ˝m zpĹŻsobem identifikuje v textech nacistickĂŠ diktatury s ĹžidovskĂ˝m myĹĄlenĂ­m příliĹĄ vĂĄzanĂ˝m na abstraktnĂ­ zĂĄkon. ZĂĄvěr člĂĄnku je nĂĄsledujĂ­cĂ­: politickĂĄ teorie Carla Schmitta je zaloĹžena na antiindividualistickĂŠ a tĂŠměř Ăşplně negativnĂ­ antropologii, kterĂĄ je doprovĂĄzenĂĄ teoriĂ­ sekularizace popisujĂ­cĂ­ proces neutralizace a depolitizace lidskĂŠho Ĺživota, kterĂ˝ tak ztrĂĄcĂ­ na vĂĄĹžnosti. Tento zpĹŻsob Ĺživota postrĂĄdajĂ­cĂ­m jakoukoliv transcendenci a utĂĄpějĂ­cĂ­ se pouze v obstarĂĄvĂĄnĂ­ je pak pro Schmitta Ĺživotem velmi bĂ­dnĂ˝m a neautentickĂ˝m. Celou tuto komplexnĂ­ problematiku pak člĂĄnek hodnotĂ­ na pozadĂ­ vĂ˝voje německĂŠho katolicismu v 19. stoletĂ­, do jehoĹž kontextu Schmitt nĂĄleĹžel.

Reveals how socialist discourses and psychoanalytic ideas shaped the modern models of motherhood envisioned by left-wing and socially critical women writers working in the Weimar press and literary spheres.Women's experiences and opportunities in the Weimar Republic (1919-1933) were shaped by tensions between advances in women's rights and widespread adherence to conservative notions of gender roles and women's maternal duty. This book explores these tensions, which were particularly pronounced on the political left, by analyzing socialist and socially critical women writers' interventions in contemporary debates on gender and women's role in society. For women in Weimar Germany, writing represented a subversive medium through which they could individualize reproductive politics and imagine modern models of mothering. Relatable and aspirational mothering practices and mother figures feature in the literary and journalistic texts examined in this book. Theoretical and instructional works (by Alice Rühle-Gerstel and Henny Schumacher) and examples from the Social Democratic women's magazine Frauenwelt demonstrate how women writers adopted and adapted emerging psychological ideas to position their texts as modern and authoritative. A close analysis of critically neglected didactic texts (by Hermynia Zur Mühlen, Maria Leitner, Elfriede Brüning, and Else Kienle) and socially critical popular fiction (by Irmgard Keun, Vicki Baum, and Gabriele Tergit) exposes how women writers envisaged models of motherhood and family that were compatible with their political beliefs and modern lifestyles. This book reveals a pragmatic discourse that advocated progressive policies regarding reproductive choice and the rights of single mothers while leaving notions of women's maternal nature and duty largely unchallenged.

Selected stages in the life and oeuvre of the natural philosopher Bemhard Bavink (1879-1947) are discussed in historical context with particular emphasis on scientiftc issues. Based on materials from the Berlin Document Center, and from his estate located in BielefeId, and supplemented by his unpublished autobiography written between 1941 and 1945 as well as by several of Bavink's papers;appearing in the journal Unsere Welt edited by him from 1920 on, and by certain passages in Bavink's books, this paper presents evidence of his courageous fight during the National Socialist (NS) regime in Germany for what he considered the untainted ,ethos of science' independent of nationality or religion. TItis is the more astonishing since before 1933, Bavink shared right-wing (Deutschnationale) politicaI opinions such as antisemitism with many of his colleagues (Fritz Ringer's Mandarins), and he only gradually realized that the new system, initially welcomed as the end of the unloved Weimar Republic, was much worse than expected. Special emphasis is given to the efforts of NS institutions to gain control over the maverick Bavink and to the reasons why they did not fully succeed in this. Extracts of letters by Planck, Joos, Finkelnburg and others demonstrate that Bavink had a vital role in the efforts of german physicists to resist the intrusion and spread of explicit anti-Semitism and NS racist ideology into their domain. It is illustrated here that it was quite possible to voice and to publish nonconformist opinions, contrary to the widespread view of lhis perlod as a time of drastic ,realignment' (Gleichschaltung) of all branches of public life to the doctrines of the German National Socialist Party (NSDAP). Because of his political ,unreliability' Bavink was prevented from getting a well-deserved chair for natural philosophy in Münster in 1941-43 and had to relinquish editorship of Unsere Welt in 1940, but neither he nor his family suffered any more drastic consequences.

There is a need for illuminated cycle clothing that is comfortable and safe when cycling, and stylish to wear during other activities. It is particularly challenging to integrate lighting within textiles without compromising the drape and comfort of the textile structure. A team of electronics, textiles and fashion specialists was formed to design and make an illuminated jacket for use by cyclists. The jacket incorporates bespoke woven panels that integrate electronic yarns within the pattern. These were designed and made for this project, with fluorescent and retroreflective yarns also included in the weave. LEDs integrated within the electronic yarns illuminate the elbows of the jacket, without causing constraint or adding excess volume. The movement of the jacket elbows during cycling widens the body outline and makes the lighting eye-catching. The collaboration between electronics and textiles experts overcame challenges including development of electrical circuitry designed specifically to fit into the jacket unobtrusively, without interfering with movement or rucksack straps. Electrical connections were required between the electronic yarns assimilated within the weave. Standard, rigid solder joints would have been difficult to form without damaging the cloth and would have been liable to breakage within the garment structure, so embroidery techniques were used to create flexible, conductive connections. The illuminated jacket provides a working prototype, demonstrating the potential for further collaborative ventures in which electronics are integrated into garments that are stylish, functional and ‘wearable’. Further interdisciplinary research will include the development of additional wearable prototypes that enhance safety and wellbeing, whilst addressing the recycling of the textiles and garments, including the safe separation and disposal of electronic yarn and other components that provide electrical functionality.

The Weimar Republic (1918–33) was a pivotal period of German and European history and a laboratory of modernity. This handbook is a comprehensive reference book presenting the key findings of recent research on Weimar Germany in the most concise and accessible way. Weimar is often presented as a warning from history, and as such invoked time and time again when challenges of democratic governance are debated. But the chapters of the Handbook demonstrate that Weimar’s history is more than just the lead-up to the Third Reich or a crisis-ridden democracy: It was a period of bold experimentation in politics, society, and culture. Written by an international team of leading experts, the Handbook’s thirty-three chapters provide cutting-edge synthesis of all key topics in the history of Germany’s first democracy, covering social, political, economic, and cultural history with a focus on the historical openness of the period. The Handbook also includes a section with chronological chapters on key developments in the political sphere. Each of the chapters can be read on its own. In addition to established topics, the book includes crucial areas of Weimar history that are often forgotten. These cover the relevance of religion, the strength of pro-republican groups, federalism and nationalism, the significance of rural communities and the agricultural sector, as well as the importance of mass and visual cultures for Weimar contemporaries. Navigating Weimar Germany’s complex and contradictory history is made easier by the sound compass this Handbook provides to all readers interested in this turbulent period.

This chapter reconsiders developments in high politics in Germany in the period 1930–30 January 1933. It seeks in particular to review the manoeuvres that culminated in Hitler’s appointment as chancellor in the light of the two approaches which have underpinned much research on the Weimar Republic in general in recent decades. On the one hand, the Fischerites and Bielefeld School had argued that the fundamental problem of the Weimar Republic lay in its want of modernity, in the many hangovers from imperial Germany which characterised it, and most of all in the continuing and structurally determined power of Germany’s ‘old elites’ working together in a close ‘alliance’. This perspective was anchored in the Sonderweg thesis, which, positing a ‘Western’ norm of modernisation, held Germany to have been an aberrant exception. Detlev Peukert challenged this approach at its roots. In a seminal study first published in 1987 under the title Die Weimarer Republik: Die Krisenjahre der klassischen Moderne, 1 he here asserted that Weimar Germany, far from having missed some kind of alleged opportunity to modernise, represented a paradigmatic, indeed a ‘classical’ case, of modernity. An advanced capitalist economy, a welfare state that was even enshrined in the constitution, a large and growing service sector, bureaucracy and administrative systems, a shared belief in science and scientificity as a kind of cure-all — these are among the hallmarks of ‘classical modernity’ as he defined it.