CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2018
| Author | Inglis, Cody James |
|---|---|
| Title | Elective Affinity and Crisis: Intellectual Entanglements and Political Divergences in the Weber Circle, 1912-17 |
| Summary | This thesis aims to reconstruct the dynamics of the Weber Circle during the high point of its activity in Heidelberg: 1912–17. During this period, a critical mass of intellectuals interacted with one another in close contact. These figures included, among others, Max and Marianne Weber, Edgar Jaffé and Else Jaffé-von Richtofen, Emil Lederer, Heinrich Rickert, Ernst Bloch, Georg von Lukács, Emil Lask, and Gustav Radbruch. Although this group came from numerous different intellectual contexts—e.g., neo-Kantian philosophy, antipositivistic sociology, romantic anti-capitalism—they each left their marks on one another, often publishing in the same journals, and most interacting with one another on the designated Sunday “jours” that the Webers’ held in their home on the Neckar. The house on Ziegelhäuser Landstraße 17 served as the physical center of this exchange—a central, scenic meeting place for salon-type activity. The investigation draws upon a wealth of theoretical tools—Karl Mannheim’s “sociology of the intelligentsia,” Reinhart Koselleck’s distinction between “space of experience” and “horizon of expectation,” as well as Goethe’s rendering of “elective affinity”—in order to characterize the interactions of the Weber Circle. This thesis asks how it could be the case that intellectuals so tightly bound together on personal and intellectual terms could split apart so radically in the wake of the First World War. In order to dive into this distinction, I use Koselleck’s heuristic use of “crisis” to organize two reactions to the war: Emil Lask’s enlistment and Georg von Lukács’ resentment. What emerges is a composite picture of an intellectual circle that, when faced with a moment of world-historical crisis, fractured along pre-defined lines of stress. This thesis asserts that moments of historical crisis reconstitute previously “secure” elective affinities between intellectuals due to their status as intellectuals: thus, one must look at intellectual contexts, local situations, and macro-historical events in the same perspective. |
| Supervisor | Trencsényi, Balázs; Gyáni, Gábor |
| Department | History MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2018/inglis_cody.pdf |
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