Meike Schmidt-Gleim - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Drafts by Meike Schmidt-Gleim

Hope between fatalism and revolution, 2009

The industrial revolution brought a concept of history to the fore, which haunts us up to our pre... more The industrial revolution brought a concept of history to the fore, which haunts us up to our present time and place, even though historical events did nothing to prove its validity: The belief in progress—not only in terms of technical development, but of social maturation. Humanity will advance step by step to a higher level, to achieve a better world and attain the end of history. This ideology secularized and institutionalized hope in the sense that people expected progress to happen as an automated process without the need for human intervention.
Walter Benjamin wrote: the astonishment of the social-democrats when fascism emerged was not philosophical—it was an apriori one. Due to the preconfigured vision of progress the apparent occurrence of terror and oppression seemed like a historical slip. And was soon reinterpreted as a necessary stage of development.
The belief in progress was not interrupted by these events. When the war in ex-Yugoslavia broke out, we reacted with the same astonishment as the social democrats in the 1930s: How is it possible that a war, as brutal as this one, can break out at the end of 20th century in the midst of Europe? Like a weeble the belief in progress had stood up and sneeked into our minds again.
Shall we just give up hope? Obviously, the answer is no. But hope must rest on our agency. It must be based on the insight that any peaceful status is precarious and depends on us. ‘History is not doing what it wants.’ It is doing what some want.
Benjamin therefore relocated hope in revolution, and revolutionary force in revenge as well as solidarity with the dispossessed. Hope is embedded in hopelessness, in the idea that the course of the world will always be on the side of the winners. Hope is to go against the hope that everything will become good one day.

Hope; Progress; Walter Benjamin; Language; Agency; Uncertainty; Memory; Time

La chronique du mur de Berlin, 2010

Il y a plus que vingt ans que le mur de Berlin est tombé. Mais il semble que tout le monde se sou... more Il y a plus que vingt ans que le mur de Berlin est tombé. Mais il semble que tout le monde se souvient parfaitement de ce moment. Aujourd’hui, de nombreux politiciens prétendent en avoir été les témoins ou activistes de la première heure, comme si leur présence avait sécurisé le déroulement des évènements dans une bonne direction. À l’occasion du vingtième anniversaire de la chute du mur en 2009, ils étaient tous pressés de raconter: “moi, j’étais là quand le mur est tombé”. Dans le sauna (Angela Merkel), en Pologne (Hans-Dietrich Genscher) ou à mi-chemin entre Paris et Berlin (Nicolas Sarkozy).[1] L’événement s’inscrit dans la continuité de leurs propres vies et trouve une place entre deux activités, le déjeuner et le dîner. Pour ne plus déranger.

In diesem Text untersuche ich die Bedeutung des gehäuften Aufkommens und der wachsenden Salonfähi... more In diesem Text untersuche ich die Bedeutung des gehäuften Aufkommens und der wachsenden Salonfähigkeit von Hate Speech in der demokratischen politischen Debatte der letzten Jahre. Ich stelle die These auf, dass dies weder einfach als Zerfall von Sitten zu werten sei, wenn PolitikerInnen in demokratischen Staaten Hate Speech einsetzen, noch eine befreiende Erweiterung von Meinungsfreiheit in Folge von Enttabuisierungsprozessen darstelle und genauso wenig die Erhärtung der Fronten des politischen Kampfes wiederspiegele (Letzteres ist eher Ergebnis nicht Ursache von Hate Speech). Wie im Titel steht, ist es nicht Hass, der spricht, wenn Hate Speech als Mittel der Politik eingesetzt wird, sondern eine in Institutionen sedimentierte Tradition.
Hate Speech ist vielmehr Teil der Konstitution einer umfassenden ideologischen Formation und Veränderung demokratischer Diskurse, in der eine Reihe von Begriffen eine neue Bedeutung erhalten und neue Sinnzusammenhänge herstellen, und in der Hate Speech als demokratische Praxis legitimiert wird.

The crisis of western liberal representative democracy has been widely expressed. Yet, it remains... more The crisis of western liberal representative democracy has been widely expressed. Yet, it remains opaque why many of the recent political contestations have rather deteriorating effects on democracy, whereas protests have been fruitful for democracy in the past. Political practices such as anti-elite protests, popular vote practices (or referenda), social media mobilisations, but also the transformation of the electoral process through commercial mediatisation, disrupt the hitherto mutually productive relation between protests and representative liberal democracy. The paper argues that this is due to a transformation of the processes of politicisation in the last 20 years. This transformation can be clarified in a confrontation between two concepts: the political and politicisation. Whereas it is the absence of the political which causes the compromising effects on democracy. The following analysis will therefore explore the concepts of politicisation and the political and explain why the absence of the political has a compromising impact on democracy. The argument is inspired by a rereading of a text by Jacques Rancière from the 1990s with the title Democracy and Postdemocracy.1 The text conveys an elucidating understanding of the political. However rereading it enlightens also how much the political landscape has changed since the text has been written. As a consequence the essay by Rancière can serve to depict the transformation of the landscape of politicisation in a historically comparative perspective.

The title of the conference "The Europe of women" opens a vast field of research. So where to sta... more The title of the conference "The Europe of women" opens a vast field of research. So where to start interrogating the interrelations of these two concepts, Europe and women (-if one does not want to go back to mythology)? What struck me thinking about the concepts of the title was that they have something in common. Europe and women are both equivocal terms. Neither Europe nor Women build a unity-as there is not one Europe, and even less one Europe of Women or one type of woman. The Europe does not exist and women do not form unanimity. Europe is Europes, a geographical formation-a continent, a number of political institutions-the EU, a history full of conflicts and diverging histories and also an utopian project of a more peaceful future. Europe is a contentious object argued about and transformed during history, it changes its guise due to perspectives and political stakes.

Papers by Meike Schmidt-Gleim

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Work-in-progress presentation: ATLAS OF ARCADIA is the title of a project by Anna Artaker and Mei... more Work-in-progress presentation: ATLAS OF ARCADIA is the title of a project by Anna Artaker and Meike Schmidt-Gleim. What is the meaning of this title? A cartographical encyclopedia of Utopia? A guide to a golden age beyond social constraints, meaning a kind of original classless society symbolically incorporated by the Arcadian pastoral people of the antiquity? The title of the project ATLAS OF ARCADIA is composed of two parts, Atlas and Arcadia. Each of these two parts represents certain fund..

Vernissage: 03.05.13, 19h Ausstellungsdauer: 04.05.–18.05.13 Öffnungszeiten: Do., Fr., Sa. 16h–19... more Vernissage: 03.05.13, 19h Ausstellungsdauer: 04.05.–18.05.13 Öffnungszeiten: Do., Fr., Sa. 16h–19h Uhr Führung durch die Ausstellung mit den Künstlerinnen und Roland Fischer-Briand, Mitherausgeber von Streulicht, am Samstag dem 18.05.13 um 17h. Die Ausstellung WAS NIE GESCHRIEBEN WURDE LESEN ist die erste Präsentation des künstlerischen Forschungsprojekts ATLAS VON ARKADIEN. Mit dem ATLAS VON ARKADIEN unternehmen Anna Artaker und Meike S. Gleim eine zweifache Übersetzung von Walter Benjamins ..

The third issue of Anthropology & Materialism embarks on a trip to the land of utopia. Waving goo... more The third issue of Anthropology & Materialism embarks on a trip to the land of utopia. Waving goodbye to the "end of history", the contributions gathered in this issue explore multiple forms of longing for an elsewhere and an otherwise. They show that utopia still inhabits the existing world, be it in the shape of dialectical images, artistic experiments or political movements. El tercer número de Anthropology & Materialism nos lleva a las tierras de la Utopía. Dejando de lado las previsiones catastróficas del "fin de la historia", las contribuciones aquí reunidas exploran diversas formas de propender a otro lugar y a otro modo de ser y muestran que la utopía aún habita en el mundo tal como se presenta, tomando los contornos de imágenes dialécticas, de experimentaciones artísticas o de movimientos políticos. Le troisième numéro d'Anthropology & Materialism vous emmène en terres d'utopie. Laissant à quai les sinistres prévisions sur la "fin de l'h...

Zwei Beispiele aus der Serie "Pendants" von Anna Artaker und Meike S. Gleim "Ich h... more Zwei Beispiele aus der Serie "Pendants" von Anna Artaker und Meike S. Gleim "Ich habe früher gesagt, daß in der Periode der Empfindsamkeit Tempel der Freundschaft und Zärtlichkeit errichtet wurden; als dann der antikisierte Geschmack kam, da tauchten als bald in den Gärten, in den Parks, auf den Höhen Tempel oder tempelartige Gebäude in Menge, nicht bloß den Grazien oder Apoll und Musen gewidmet, sondern auch die Wirtschaftsgebäude, die Scheunen und Viehställe wurden im Tempelstil erbaut.” (J..

Bangkok is the venue of bloodshed these days. The number of dead and injured people rises every c... more Bangkok is the venue of bloodshed these days. The number of dead and injured people rises every couple of days. It had all started with a different sort of bloodshed in March this year, when many demonstrators against the government (that had seized power in a military putsch in 2006) and its police forces shed their blood without being injured. “As dawn broke on March 16, hundreds lined up at medical tents, where nurses siphoned blood from their veins into two-liter water bottles and juice j..

Democratic Crisis Revisited

My article poses the question, how to narrate social protest practices to enhance their capacity ... more My article poses the question, how to narrate social protest practices to enhance their capacity to enact social change? It reflects on the relation between the narration of social practice and how its agency is perceived. It thus stresses the constitutive role of narration for the agency of social protest. The central claim of the article is that practices and their impact need to be detected, identified and named in order to appear and become seizable. The article rereads the book “Hope in the dark” by Rebecca Solnit (2016) through the lens of Walter Benjamin’s approach to social history and exemplified in the figure of the ragpicker. Most documentation of social protest follows traditional ways of historiography: isolating movements from one another, fetishizing them like a product brand, concentrating on actors (subjects behind the deeds), their intentionality, and dating the movements on a chronological timeline. Yet the power of social protest remains undetected in these reports. The article argues that this power lies in modes of functioning that counteract subject-based history telling, by deconstructing the standard link between agent and action and it also counteracts chronological time by deconstructing standard narratives. The lens of Walter Benjamin’s concept of history and his figure of the ragpicker allows us to see how a different narrative can allow for an empowering paradigm of narrating social protest practices: (1) First, by reading social movement and civic protest practices in a different unchronological time structure without dates, (2) second, by reading it from a different geographic perspective, a border transgressive and inclusive perspective (3) third, by widening the frame of the concept of the political beyond salience and the quantity of actor involvement and polarization (4) and fourth by taking into account the activism, the actual action without looking at the actors behind the acts thus without presupposing the condition of shared identities, as class, sex or race etc., as fundamental for political action. As such seemingly failed events of progressive political action - i.e. action aimed at equality and awareness for the needs of the disempowered – can be re-signified. In the tradition of Walter Benjamin, the article challenges and defies the manner in which history is transmitted as it repeats persisting power relations and understands its task to brush history against the grain.

Anna Artaker & Meike SCHMIDT-Gleim in the context of the project ATLAS OF ARCADIA/ im Rahmen des ... more Anna Artaker & Meike SCHMIDT-Gleim in the context of the project ATLAS OF ARCADIA/ im Rahmen des Projekts ATLAS VON ARKADIEN, published in/publiziert in Streulicht, www.streulicht-mag.com Interiors are about more than taste and comfort. As Walter Benjamin demonstrates in his Arcades Project, the interior is a mirror of our desires and a phantasmagoric reflection of society and history. History is immortalized as phantasmagoria in design objects that pretend to be more real than reality itse..

Benjamin helped us to understand that mimesis is not only reserved to art and the representation ... more Benjamin helped us to understand that mimesis is not only reserved to art and the representation of the world. It is fundamental to social conduct, language and writing, even if these mimetic roots are often hidden and unrecognizable in the language and writing of today. These images (posters on a hoarding, Basel, June 2009) therefore provoke a sort of light bulb moment. Ah, yes, why did I never think of the mouth of a hippo when I saw a power shovel, and why did I never think of a bear’s ..

Zur Methodendiskussion des Projekts ATLAS VON ARKADIEN (Anna Artaker, Meike S. Gleim), die nächst... more Zur Methodendiskussion des Projekts ATLAS VON ARKADIEN (Anna Artaker, Meike S. Gleim), die nächste Ausstellung des Projekts eröffnet am 16.10.2013, Neuer Kunstverein Wien, Hochhaus Herrengasse 6-8, http://www.neuer-kunstverein-wien.at/ Man Ray „Erst das Zusammentreffen zweier verschiedener Straßennamen macht die Magie der ‚Ecke’.“ (Walter Benjamin, GS, Bd. V.2, S. 1008) Benjamins Aussage ist leiser als Lautréamonts berühmter Satz: „Er ist schön wie das zufällige Zusammentreffen einer Nähmasc..

What happens to the world when you wake up one day and get the news that your loved one is in “Ev... more What happens to the world when you wake up one day and get the news that your loved one is in “Evin” prison (The Iranian detention center for political detainees), or worse, that they have been taken off life-support, and buried, without an autopsy? The blogger Amir (www.zahras-paradise.com) asks this question before interviewing Stephan Kazemi whose mother Zida (Zahra Kazemi), an Iranian-Canadian photojournalist, was killed in the Iranian prison “Evin” in 2003 after having taken shots of fam..

How to describe deprivation? The emergency alimentation for Haitians consists of cookies – five p... more How to describe deprivation? The emergency alimentation for Haitians consists of cookies – five packets a day per person. The Haitians have to eat cookies (referred to as biscuits). Cookies, what an irony! “Had I known that you would visit me today, I would have baked a cake” sings Ernie from Sesame Street. “But I want cookies”, interrupts Cookie monster. Cookies are the epitome of abundance. “I said to my mother not to buy me any cookies, but she does so anyway.” murmurs the artist Adrian Pi..

Hope between fatalism and revolution, 2009

Hope; Progress; Walter Benjamin; Language; Agency; Uncertainty; Memory; Time

La chronique du mur de Berlin, 2010

Item does not contain fulltext33 p

Democratic Crisis Revisited

Considerations in the Context of the Project "Atlas of Arcadia" Reading the world has a... more Considerations in the Context of the Project "Atlas of Arcadia" Reading the world has a long tradition. Philosophers have given it the name hermeneutics. The legend says that hermeneutics is named after the messenger god Hermes, who translated the incomprehensible messages of the gods and interpreted them so that they became understandable for everyone. This interpretation was a language-based translation of the divine utterances. To read the world means to verbalize it. Reading the world com..

The routine of the current representative democracies in Europe make us unaware of their fundamen... more The routine of the current representative democracies in Europe make us unaware of their fundamental condition. Moments of seeming dysfunction give a hint as to what is left out in these presumably well working systems. In this sense, the uprisings in the banlieues of France's metropolitan areas in fall 2005 shed a light on basic questions of democracy. Giving a negative example of the public understanding of representative democracy, we can-by analyzing the riots-unravel what is often forgotten about in the operations of modern democracies or reduced to a meaningless point of reference: the sovereignty of the people. Sovereignty of the people tends to be merely associated with elections. But elections widely decline to a tautological system, in that they stand for the representation of the people by creating representation according to specific voting measures and by restricting representation to these procedures. In the following text, I shall argue, on the basis of the reactions toward the riots in France in 2005, how the people are taken as unable to lead their own discourse, and in consequence remain politically unrepresented. The analysis concentrates on the accounts of the unrest transmitted by international media. It does not seek to illuminate more authentic details on behalf of the rioters, but focuses on what is missing in the media debates. It is in these discourses that a specific concept of politics is constructed, which is leaving out the question of popular sovereignty. The chapter starts by giving an overview on the events happened, then looks for what was considered to be the reason for the riots. This will be followed by an analysis of the political practice that is suggested to be applied, and by asking which political practice is missing in this panorama. The second half of the chapter treats more theoretical aspects by defining governmental representation and its counterpart, democratic representation.

Rethinking Politicisation in Politics, Sociology and International Relations, 2021

Anthropology & Materialism, 2019

Work-in-progress Präsentation „Atlas von Arkadien“ heißt das Projekt von Anna Artaker und mir. W... more Work-in-progress Präsentation „Atlas von Arkadien“ heißt das Projekt von Anna Artaker und mir. Was ist darunter zu verstehen? ein kartografisches Nachschlagewerk der Utopie? Ein Wegweiser zum „Goldenen Zeitalter jenseits gesellschaftlicher Zwänge“, zu einer Art klassenloser Urgesellschaft symbolisch verkörpert durch das antike arkadische Hirtenvolk? Der Titel unseres Projektes „Atlas von Arkadien“ setzt sich aus zwei Teilen zusammen, Atlas und Arkadien. Diese beiden Teile stehen jeweils für ..

Democratic Crisis revisited, 2022

My article poses the question, how to narrate social protest practices to enhance their capacity ... more My article poses the question, how to narrate social protest practices to enhance their capacity to enact social change? It reflects on the relation between the narration of social practice and how its agency is perceived. It thus stresses the constitutive role of narration for the agency of social protest. The central claim of the article is that practices and their impact need to be detected, identified and named in order to appear and become seizable.
The article rereads the book “Hope in the dark” by Rebecca Solnit (2016) through the lens of Walter Benjamin’s approach to social history and exemplified in the figure of the ragpicker.
Most documentation of social protest follows traditional ways of historiography: isolating movements from one another, fetishizing them like a product brand, concentrating on actors (subjects behind the deeds), their intentionality, and dating the movements on a chronological timeline. Yet the power of social protest remains undetected in these reports. The article argues that this power lies in modes of functioning that counteract subject-based history telling, by deconstructing the standard link between agent and action and it also counteracts chronological time by deconstructing standard narratives.
The lens of Walter Benjamin’s concept of history and his figure of the ragpicker allows us to see how a different narrative can allow for an empowering paradigm of narrating social protest practices: (1) First, by reading social movement and civic protest practices in a different unchronological time structure without dates, (2) second, by reading it from a different geographic perspective, a border transgressive and inclusive perspective (3) third, by widening the frame of the concept of the political beyond salience and the quantity of actor involvement and polarization (4) and fourth by taking into account the activism, the actual action without looking at the actors behind the acts thus without presupposing the condition of shared identities, as class, sex or race etc., as fundamental for political action.
As such seemingly failed events of progressive political action - i.e. action aimed at equality and awareness for the needs of the disempowered – can be re-signified. In the tradition of Walter Benjamin, the article challenges and defies the manner in which history is transmitted as it repeats persisting power relations and understands its task to brush history against the grain.

The Meanings of Europe, 2014

Le concept de la culture des masses chez Walter Benjamin, 2011

La théorie de Benjamin est unique dans sa manière d'approcher la société moderne, parce qu'elle n... more La théorie de Benjamin est unique dans sa manière d'approcher la société moderne, parce qu'elle ne prend pas seulement recours à la culture des masses en tant que sources des fantasmagories, mais en tant qu'origine de l'énergie collective qui vise à dépasser ces fantasmagories » a écrit Susan Buck-Morss sur le livre des passages de Benjamin. 1 En effet Benjamin n'accuse pas comme ses collègues -notamment Adorno et Horkheimerl'industrie de la culture en même temps que ses produits. Au contraire il y trouve un potentiel politique. Il aperçoit un moment politique dans la reproductibilité, la transformation de l'art et la nouvelle constitution des masses qui pourrait devenir révolutionnaire.

Benjamin hat 1934 den Text "Der Autor als Produzent" als Vortrag verfasst. Es war geplant, dass e... more Benjamin hat 1934 den Text "Der Autor als Produzent" als Vortrag verfasst. Es war geplant, dass er ihn am 27. April am Institut zum Studium des Faschismus in Paris halten sollte, es heißt aber, dass dieses Ereignis nie stattgefunden hat. Der Vortrag ist gegen die Autoren des links-bürgerlichen Spektrums gerichtet, aber wie wir sehen werden auch subversiv gegenüber einer orthodoxen Interpretation des dialektischen Materialismus, also auch gegen Teile von jenen, die Benjamin am Institut zum Studium des Faschismus anzutreffen meinte.