2007-08 MM Early Modern Self-Fashioning

• Time: Tuesdays 10-12 am

Ever since Stephen Greenblatt introduced the term in 1980, the concept of Self-Fashioning has energised both historical research and literary criticism in recent years. If the self is not an originary and transhistorical given, but rather the product of historically contingent techniques, then it becomes interesting to investigate the historically specific modes of constructing or experiencing the self, and to consider in what ways these forms of modelling the self are learned, chosen, imposed or rejected. During the early modern period, as Greenblatt was not the only one to argue, there was an understanding of the self as something that could be modelled or ‘fashioned’, which had got lost in nineteenth-century conceptions of identity and individuality. Our seminar will offer an opportunity to engage with this topic both in historical and theoretical perspective. We will discuss some of the recent theoretical approaches to the constructions of selfhood (Greenblatt, Foucault, Bourdieu). We will encounter a range of materials form the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that played their role in practices of self-fashioning. And we will deal especially with the aspects of ‘Self-Fashioning and Gender’, ‘Self-Fashioning and Social Status’, ‘Religious Self-Fashioning’, ‘Poetic Self-Fashioning’. Course materials will be uploaded to Stud.IP We will decide in our first meeting whether to hold the seminar in English or in German, and depending on the emphasis in the work which you contribute, you may obtain credits either in History (MM ##) or in English Studies (MM English Literatures).

Requirements for credits as a Master Module “English Literatures”: 1. Regular attendance and active participation (you may miss up to two meetings, whatever the reasons). 2. An oral contribution formulating and addressing research questions; this will help you decide on a topic for your subsequent term paper. 3. A term paper (generally dealing with one or several of the issues raised in your oral contribution; length ca. 20 pages; deadline March 1, 2008).

30.11.2007

Theorie 1: Greenblatt, Renaissance Self-Fashioning, "Introduction"

06.11.2007

Theorie 2: Foucault, "Technologies of the Self"

Fragen:

1. Was sind 'Technologien des Selbst', wie definiert und verwendet Foucault den Begriff?
2. Wie verhält es sich mit der Historizität dieser Technologien: Konstanz, Kontinuität, Variabilität?
3. Der Text bezieht sich großenteils auf Zeiträume von der Antike bis ins frühe Mittelalter. Wie verhält es sich mit der Transferierbarkeit von Foucaults Darstellungen und Methoden?

13.11.2007

Theorie 3: Pierre Bourdieu (Sozialer Sinn, Kap. III).

Die Textvorlage findet sich, zusammen mit einem weiteren Beitrag über Bourdieus Habituskonzept (von Th. Alkemeyer) noch auf Stud.IP (sorry about the bother, AK)

Hinweise zur Lektüre:

1. Gegen welche Ansätze/Sichtweisen richtet sich Bourdieu mit seiner Theorie der Praxis?
2. Was beinhaltet die Theorie der Praxis?
3. Habitus (Bedeutung, Entstehung)
4. Habitus als Produkt der Geschichte – was ist damit gemeint?
5. Interiorisierung der Exteriorität – Bedeutung?
6. Satz S. 103, 1. Absatz (Mitte) „Nichts ist trügerischer als die rückblickende Illusion …“ bis „…ständig definiert und umdefiniert“. – Bedeutung?
7. Rolle des „Unbewussten“
8. Habitusformen und Klassen
9. Klassenhabitus – individueller Habitus

20.11.2007

Conduct Books for (aristocratic) Men

Students: Josefowicz, Kreutzer

27.11.2007

Conduct Books for Women Students: Krause, Nolte, Plock

04.12.2007

Religious self fashioning: manuals of piety

Students: Leismann, Friedel, Kramer

11.12.2007

Bunyan, Grace Abounding

Students: Sip, Koopmann, Gerdes, Moik

18.12.2007

Weber, Protestantische Ethik

Students: Neidhöfer, Feil

08.01.2008

Mode/ Kleiderordnungen

Waschkowski, Möhlmann

15.01.2008

Poetic Self-FAshioning 1:

1 and 2: Mahn, Stawick, Debruyn, Neal, Fieske, Tönnies

Background Reading

29.01.2008

Evaluation. Retrospect. Questions and Conclusions.

05.02.2008

Feedback on Evaluation. -- Retrospect. Questions and Conclusions.

Texts

• Foucault, Michel. "Technologies of the Self".

• Greenblatt, Stephen. Renaissance Self-Fashioning (preface)

• Foucault, Michel. "The Political Technology of Individuals".

• Foucault, Michel. "The Subject and Power" (afterword)

• Foucault, Michel. "Governmentality".

• Martin, John. "Inventing Sincerity, Refashioning Prudence: The Discovery of the Individual in Renaissance Europe".

Further Reading

McKenzie, Don, "Speech-Manuscript-Print," The Library Chronicle 22 (1990), 87-109.