Performing Knowledge, 1750-1850 by Dupree, Mary Helen; Franzel, Sean B.;

Short description:

The series publishes monographs and edited volumes that showcase significant scholarly work at the various intersections that currently motivate interdisciplinary inquiry in German cultural studies. Topics span all periods of German and German-speaking lands and cultures from the local to the global, with a special focus on demonstrating how various disciplines - history, musicology, art history, anthropology, religious studies, media studies, political theory, literary and cultural studies, among others - and new theoretical and methodological paradigms work across disciplinary boundaries to create knowledge and add to critical understanding in German studies broadly. All works are in English. Three to four new titles will be published annually.

Long description:

The period between 1750 and 1850 was a time when knowledge and its modes of transmission were reconsidered and reworked in fundamental ways. Social and political transformations, such as the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution, went hand in hand with in new ways of viewing, sensing, and experiencing what was perceived to be a rapidly changing world. This volume brings together a range of essays that explore the performance of knowledge in the period from 1750 to 1850, in the broadest possible sense. The essays explore a wide variety of literary, theatrical, and scientific events staged during this period, including scientific demonstrations, philosophical lectures, theatrical performances, stage design, botany primers, musical publications, staged Schiller memorials, acoustic performances, and literary declamations. These events served as vital conduits for the larger process of generating, differentiating, and circulating knowledge. By unpacking the significance of performance and performativity for the creation and circulation of knowledge in Germany during this period, the volume makes an important contribution to interdisciplinary German cultural studies, performance studies, and the history of knowledge.

"Der vorliegende Sammelband verbindet in insgesamt dreizehn Beiträgen beide Perspektiven und spitzt sie in Gestalt der beiden Sektionen ,,Sounds and Stages“ und ,,Pedagogies and Publics“ zugleich auf die Forschungsinteressen der Herausgeberin (Mediengeschichte der Akustik) und des Herausgebers (Kulturgeschichte der Vorlesung) zu. Die allgemeine Hypothese, dass Wissen innerhalb mehr oder weniger dramatischer Vorführungen entworfen, überprüft und vermittelt wird, bleibt dabei aber deutlich kenntlich, und der Band präsentiert überdies auch eine pointierte Diagnose zum Zusammenhang der wissensgeschichtlichen Sattelzeit um 1800 und dem Aufkommen populärer Massenmedien im gleichen Zeitraum. [...] Der Innovationsgehalt des Bandes ist mithin beträchtlich [...]"
Nicolas Pethes in: Monatshefte 110.3 (2018), 447-450

"[...] a thoughtful collection of essays reflecting on the moment of performance as part of the process of enlightenment, taken in its broader sense."
David Hill in: German Studies 2017, p. 268

"These well-researched, provocative essays offer readers much to think about; they illuminate a wide variety of cultural phenomena, all grounded historically and viewed through the lens of the performative scenario [...]. [...] Performing Knowledge will be of great interest to scholars and students of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries from a variety of fields, and should provide impetus for turther cultural-historical studies."
(Edward T. Potter, Lessing Yearbook XLIV)