300652 "Anti-Semitism, Racism and Postcolonialism" (S) (SoSe 2025)

The seminar is dedicated to the complex and conflict-laden discourse on the relationship between anti-Semitism, racism and post-colonialism as it developed in the 2010s with its strong ties to (theoretical) discussions in postcolonial studies, racism studies and anti-Semitism studies (cf. Micha Brumlik 2022). This discourse intensified in the early 2020s as the "historian's debate 2.0" on the interconnections between history and heritage of colonialism and the Holocaust (cf. S. Neiman/M. Wildt 2022; M. Rothberg 2022; Zimmerer 2023).
Central topics in this discourse arena include the Middle East conflict and related issues such as the BDS movement or settler colonialism. The aim of the course is to identify selected discourse strands and (theoretical) positions in the conflict-laden discourse, and to reflect theoretically on their formative, often mutually hierarchizing and excluding function. To this end, selected concepts (such as discourse hegemony & discourse antagonism) are introduced in order to theoretically frame the conflict constellation; the background to this is the assumption that social divisions and tensions have an ontological and thus formative character. No society is without conflicting interests (Mouffe/Laclau). A sociological-phenomenological perspective on existential experiences is added, which makes it possible to relate different experiences of vulnerability and exclusion to one another and to ask how these realities reinforce the various lines of conflict in the discourse.
The background to this is the assumption that different disciplinary approaches with diverse thematic focuses (such as postcolonial studies and anti-Semitism studies) can certainly contribute to the production of voids (of ‘the Other’); but not inevitably, but due to a specific conflictual political reality and the associated discourses – in this case the conflict between postcolonial studies and anti-Semitism studies. A guiding question is therefore how epistemic and theoretical voids and the associated exclusions and contradictions are intensified by a specific academic and/or societal positioning, and to what extent confrontational thinking is necessarily inherent to them. Another question is how representations of ‘the Other’ and the associated regimes of representation are reproduced in this context.
The basic aim of the class is to offer a space to reflect on the conflict openly and with mutual respect.

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Bibliography

M. Brumlik, Postcolonial Antisemitism. Achille Mbembe, the Palestinian BDS movement and Other Controversies. Berlin 2022.
S. Neiman/M. Wildt (Hrsg.), Historiker streiten. Gewalt und Holocaust – die Debatte. Berlin 2022.
M. Rothberg, Lived multidirectionality: “Historikerstreit 2.0” and the politics of Holocaust memory, in: Memory Studies 115 (6): 1316-1329.
N. Sznaider, Bürde und Würde, in: D. Kiesel/N. Sznaider/ O. Zimmermann (Hrsg.), Medienbild im Wandel: Jüdinnen und Juden in Deutschland. Dokumentation des Thementags der Initiative kulturelle Integration, Berlin 2022, 42–49, 45
J. Wullweber, C. Kunze & I. Dzudzek (Hrsg.), Diskurs und Hegemonie. Gesellschaftskritische Perspektiven, Bielefeld 2014.
P. Ullrich, Deutsche, Linke und der Nahostkonflikt. Politik im Antisemitismus- und Erinnerungsdiskurs, Berlin, 2008.
P. Ullrich et al. (Hrsg.), Was ist Antisemitismus? Begriffe und Definitionen von Judenfeindschaft, Göttingen 2024.
J. Zimmerer (Hrsg.), Erinnerungskämpfe. Neues deutsches Geschichtsbewusstsein, Stuttgart 2023.