Andreas Huyssen
Present Pasts: Urban Palimpsests and the Politics of Memory (2003) Introduction: The Crisis of History HIS!"# I$ H% PAS Used to mar& the relation of a community or a nation to its past' ith stroner boundaries beteen past and present*
Stron temporal boundaries' less historioraphy sources*
HIS!"# I$ H% P"%S%$ Historioraphy impines upon the present throuh modern media of reproduction' as ell as throuh the e+plosion of historical scholarship and an e,er more ,oracious museal culture* The past has become part of the present in ways simply unimaginable in earlier centuries. As a result, temporal boundaries have weaened as the e!periential dimension of space has shrun (throuh ad,ances in transportation)*
-.iscourse as there to uarantee the relati,e stability of the past in its pastness* raditions' e,en thouh themsel,es often in,ented or constructed and alays based on selections and e+clusions' a,e shape to cultural and social life* "uilt urban space# replete with monuments and museums, palaces, public spaces, and gov. buildings $ represented the material traces of the historical past in the present.% &emory was a topic of poets and their visions.
$ineteenth century concern of nation/ states mobili1e and monumentali1e national and uni,ersal pasts so as to leitimi1e and i,e meanin to the present and to en,ision en, ision the future culturally' politically' politically' socially* socially* his model no loner or&s*
ontemporary society percei,es this fundamental disturbance of history itself and its promises* promises* At sta&e sta&e in current historymemory debate is not only a disturbance of our notions of the past' but a fundamental crisis in our imaination of alternati,e futures* Modernity4s Modernity4s price destruction of past ays a ys of li,in and bein in the orld* here as no liberation ithout acti,e destruction* And the destruction of the past brouht forettin* 5rom the beinnin' modernity as to/faced in its neotiations ith cultural memory*
Introduction 'part ii(: The Hypertrophy of &emory -Althouh I ould aree ith a certain sense of e+cess and saturation in the mar&etin of memory' I thin& that the call simply to mo,e on ris&s forfeit hat the recent con,ulsions of memory discourse ha,e enerated* .irected aainst the culture culture industry4s industry4s e+ploitation of hot themes and popular topics' the call to foret memory 6ust reproduces the industry4s on fast/paced mechanism of declarin declarin obsolescence* And it fails fails to i,e us a plausible plausible e+planation for the obsession ith memory itself as a sinificant symptom of our cultural present*7 P*3 P*3
-If the "omantics thouht that memory bound us in some deep sense to times past' ith melancholia bein one of its liminal manifestations' then today e rather thin& of memory as a mode of re/presentation and as belonin e,er more to the present* After all' the act of rememberin is alays sin and of the present' hile its referent is of the past and thus absent* Ine,itably' e,ery act of memory memory carries ith it a dimension dimension of betrayal' forettin' forettin' and absence*7 P*3/8 P*3/8 )The form in which we thin of the past is increasingly memory without borders rather than national history within borders. &odernity has brought with it a very real compression of time and and space. "ut in the register of imaginaries, it has also e!panded our hori*ons of time and space beyond the local, the national and even the international. In certain ways, then, our contemporary obsessions with memory in the present may well be an indication that our ways of thining and living temporality itself are undergoing a significant shift.% P.+
his last 9uote could ell e+plain the nomadic tales of Austerlit1 Austerlit1 or he "ins of Saturn' all of Sebald4s no,els seem to ha,e this inherent driftin of boundaries and memory throuh the physical force of tra,el and the mental restlessness of one ho remembers ith deep melancholy* :i&e Huyssen puts it it it may portend for the emerence of a ne paradim of thin&in about time and space' history and eoraphy in the tenty/first century*
Present Pastas and ur &odernity
Huyssen assumes no role in the disputes beteen historians historians and memorians* He ascertains his dual role as a cultural historian and literary critic* -; I remain con,inced that the e+plosion of memory discourses at the end of the tentieth century has added sinificantly to the ays e understand history and deal ith the temporal dimensions of social social and cultural life* Issues of memory ha,e become part part of public discourse and cultural life in ays rarely achie,ed by professional historioraphy historioraphy alone*7 p*8/< He ishes to point out that hilst memory as considered a pri,ate and literary matter in the =I=th century' in the ==th it seems to ha,e become part of a public discourse*
-he enlihtened notion that one can learn from history has been so ,iolently dispro,ed both at the social and the political le,els as ell as in its e+periential e+periential dimension that the ,ery leitimacy of the historical enterprise is sha&en* (;) History in a certain canonical form may be deleitimi1ed as far as its core pedaoical and philosophical mission is concerned' but the seduction of the archi,e and its tro,e of stories of human achie,ement and sufferin has ne,er been reater* >ut hat ood is the memory archi,e?7 P*< P*< onscious of the unreliability u nreliability of memory' Huyssen e+plores reasons as to h y e4re thirsty for memory archi,es* It4s not a matter of $iet1sche4s creati,e forettin' nor is it that that these solutions pro,ide a promisin future (neoliberal technoloically lobali1ed ,ies seem domineerin)* He ma&es an interestin comment I ish to preser,e* -Such triumphalism of lobal flos is nothin but a form of uncreati,e forettin that inores the history of capitalist cycles and the crashes of technoloical utopias* Already the lobali1ation fantasies of the @0s ha,e themsel,es become part of the memory archi,e and its cabinet of delusions* It is all more important that at a time hen an a,alanche of memory discourses seems to ha,e o,erhelmed an earlier acti,ist imaination of the future' e actually do remember the future and try to en,ision alternati,es to the current status 9uo* It 6ust ill not do to replace the tentieth tentieth century4s obsessions obsessions ith the future ith our nely found obsessions ith the past* Be need both past and future to articulate our political' social' and cultural dissatisfactions ith the present state of the orld* (;) memory discourses are absolutely essential to imaine the future and to reain a stron temporal and spatial roundin of life and the imaination in a media and consumer society that increasinly ,oids temporality and collapses space*7 P*C P*C &edia of Cultural &emory
In this section' Huyssen outlines the basic concerns his essays ill aim to comment on* -he essays of this boo& (;) read specific urban phenomena' artor&s and literary te+ts that function as media of critical cultural memory today* today* he focus is e+clusi,ely on practices of the present*7 P*C P*C -Memory and temporality ha,e in,aded spaces and media that seemed amon the most stable and fi+ed cities' cities' monuments' architecture and sculpture* After the the anin of modernist fantasies (;) and the desire for purity of ne beinnins' we have come to read cities and buildings as palimpsests of space, monuments as transformable and transitory' and sculpture as sub6ect to the ,icissitudes , icissitudes of time*7 P*D P*D -Bhen literary te+ts are concerned :iterary te+ts ha,e ne,er' not e,en in modernism' been able to deny their palimpsestic nature' and the philoloical problem of differin editions has alays distinuished literature from buildins or monuments* (;) My focus on readin palimpsests (;) is rather rather the con,iction that literary techni9ues of readin historically' historically' interte+tually' interte+tually' constructi,ely and deconstructi,ely at the same time can be o,en into our understandin of urban spaces that shape collecti,e imainaries* (;) The urban essays in this boo attempt to understand the fundamental temporality of even those human
endeavors that pretend to transcend time through their material reality and relative durability.% P.-
-;too much of the contemporary memory discourse focuses on the personal E on testimony' testimony' memoir' sub6ecti,ity' traumatic traumatic memory E either in poststructuralist psychoanalytic perspecti,e or in attempts to shore up a therapeutic popular sense of the authentic and e+periential* (;) he privileging of trauma formed a thic discursive ith those other master/sinifiers of the @0s' the ab6ect and the uncanny' all of networ ith hich ha,e to do ith repression' specters' and a present repetiti,ely haunted by the past* (;) must be due to the fact that trauma as a psychic phenomenon is located on the threshold beteen rememberin and forettin' seein and not seein' transparency and occlusion' e+perience and its absence in repetition* >ut trauma cannot be the central category in addressing the larger memory discourse. '( to collapse memory into trauma, I thin, would unduly confine our understanding of memory, maring it too e!clusively in terms of pain, suffering and loss. '( &odernity as the trauma that victimi*es the world, that we cannot leave behind, that causes all our symptoms 7 P*F G omment on Sebald -fundamentally concerned ith haunted space and spatial imainaries*7
HAP%" @ Present Pasts: &edia, Politics, Amnesia. Amnesia. I -!ne of the most surprisin cultural and political phenomena of recent years has been the emerence of memory as a &ey cultural and political concern in Bestern societies' a turnin toard the past that stands in star& contrast to the pri,ilein of the future (;) Since the @F0s' it seems' the focus has shifted from present futures to present pasts, and this shift in the e!perience and sensibility of time needs to be e!plained historically and phenomenologically.% P.// P.//
He narrates the acceleration of memory discourses in %urope and the United States by the @F0s' ho the Holocaust too& center stae in ma&in certain international e,ents (mostly related to ermany) rele,ant* here has also been a debate about the the Americani1ation Americani1ation of the Holocaust* -At this point one must indeed raise the 9uestion to hat e+tent one can no spea& of a lobali1ation of Holocaust discourse* (;) !ne the one had' the Holocaust has become a cipher for the tentieth century as a hole and for the failure of the pro6ect of enlihtenment* It ser,es as proof of Bestern Bestern ci,ili1ation4s failure to practice anamnesis' to reflect on its constituti,e inability to li,e in peace ith difference and otherness' and to dra the conse9uences from the insidious relationship amon enlihtened modernity' racial
oppression' and orani1ed ,iolence* !n the other hand' this totali1in totali1in dimension of Holocaust discourse so pre,alent in much postmodern thouht is accompanied by a dimension that particulari1es and locali1es* It is precisely the emergence of the Holocaust as a universal trope that allows Holocaust memory to latch on to specific local situations that are historically distant and politically distinct from the original event. '( The Holocaust as a universal trope is a prere0uisite for its decentering and its use as a powerful prism through which we may loo at other instances of genocide. '( it may also serve as a screen memory or simply bloc insight into specific local histories.% P./+ P./+ Huyssen then probes on different e+amples on ho other nations deal ith their local enocides' but there is one thin that is essentially different from the Holocaust -;it is important to reconi1e that althouh memory discourses appear to be lobal in one reister' at their core they remain tied to the stories of specific nations and states* (;) Bhate,er differences may be beteen postar ermany and South Africa' Arentina Arentina and the politica political l site site of memory practices is still national, not post#national or global. hile' the This does have implications for interpretive wor. Although the Holocaust as a universal trope of traumatic history has migrated into other, nonrelated conte!ts, one must always as whether and how the trope enhances or hinders local memory practices and struggles, or whether and how it may help and hinder at the same time.% P./1
II -he ,ery structures of public media ma&e it 9uite understandable that our secular culture today' obsessed ith memory as it is' is also someho in the rips of fear' e,en a terror' or forettin* (;) My hypothesis here is that e are tryin to counteract this fear an d daner of forettin ith ith sur,i,al strateies of public and pri,ate memoriali1ation* memoriali1ation* he turn toard memory is subliminally eneri1ed by the desire to anchor oursel,es in a orld characteri1ed by an increasin instability instability of time and the fracturin fracturin of li,ed space* At the same time' e &no that such strateies of memoriali1ation may in the end themsel,es be transitory and incomplete*7 P*@F P*@F
III -;e cannot discuss personal' enerational' or public memory separately from the enormous influence of the ne media as carriers of all forms of memory* (;) e,en if the Holocaust has been endlessly commodified this does not mean that each and e,ery commodification ine,itably banali1es it as an historical e,ent* here is no pure space outside of commodity culture' hoe,er much e may desire such a space*7 p*@F/@ -My arument here is this the problem is not sol,ed by simply opposin serious memory to tri,ial memory (;)* his is not to say that anythin oes* he 9uestion of 9uality remains one to be decided case by case* >ut the semiotic ap cannot be closed by any orthodo+y of correct representation* representation* o arue as much' amounts to Holocaust modernism*
Indeed' phenomena such as (;) sur,i,or testimonies compel us to thin& of traumatic memory and entertainment memory toether as occupyin the same public space' rather than to see them as located precisely at the threshold beteen traumatic memory and the commercial media* (;) 5or the trauma is mar&eted as much as the fun is' and not e,en for different memory consumers*7 P*@ P*@ -Be do &no that the media do not transport public memory innocently* hey shape it in their structure and form* And here E in line ith Mc:uhan4s Mc:uhan4s ell/orn point that the medium is the messae E it becomes hihly sinificant that the poer of our most ad,anced electronics depends entirely on 9uantities of memory* (;) Simply put' the past is sellin better than the future' but for ho lon' one onders* (;) ettin stuc& in an e,er/ shrin&in present*7 P*20/2@ P*20/2@
I -Somethin else must be at sta&e that produces the desire for the pat in the first place and that ma&es us respond so so fa,orably to the memory mar&ets* mar&ets* hat somethin' I ould suest' is a slow but palpable transformation of temporality in our lives, brought on by the comple! intersections of technological change, mass media, and new patterns of consumption, wor, and global mobility.% P.2/ Ha,in mulled o,er Balter >en6amin and Adorno in the pre,ious chapters' he decides to ma&e tension beteen their aruments instead of sidin ith any of them* He turns to philosopher Herman :Jbbe (from the @F0s)* He as the one to describe the incremental -museali1ation7 as a central central to the shiftin temporal temporal sensibility of our time* It is no loner bound to the institution of the museum' but rather infiltrated all areas of life* -:Jbbe4s arument arument about the shrin&in e+tension of the present points to a reat parado+ the more the present of advanced consumer capitalism prevails over the past and the future, suc&in both into an e+pandin synchronous space' the weaer the grip on itself, the less stability or identity it pro,ides for contemporary sub6ects*7 P*23 P*23
-The conservative argument about shifts in temporal sensibility needs to be taen out of its binary framing (lieu+ ,s* milieu+ in $ora' entropy of the past ,s* compensatory museali1ation in :Jbbe) and pushed in a different direction' one that does not rely on loss and that accepts the fundamental shift in structures of feelin' e+perience' and perception as they characteri1e our simultaneously e+pandin and shrin&in present*7 P*28 P*28
his last arument is essential for defeatin binary solutions to the thouhts of memory and to defeat the binary communicational code (hich means >arthes) to read Sebald* ontemporary approaches to memory cannot be binary because our temporal sensibility and the strateies employed to capture it are not that limited*
-Memories of the tentieth century confront us not ith a better life' but ith a uni9ue history of enocide and mass destruction that mars a priory any attempt to lorify the past* After the e+periences of o f Borld Borld Bar Bar I and the reat .epression' of Stalinism' $a1ism' and enocide on an unprecedented scale' after the trials of decoloni1ation and the histories of atrocities and repression they ha,e brouht to our consciousness' the ,ie of Bestern Bestern modernity and its promises has h as dar&ened considerably ithin the Best Best itself* (;) In an era of ethnic cleansins and refuee crises' mass mirations and lobal mobility for e,er more people' the e+perience of displacement and relocation' miration and diaspora seems no loner the e+ception but the rule*7 P*2< P*2< -Memory' after after all' can be no n o substitute for 6ustice' and 6ustice itself ill ine,itably be entanled ith the unreliability of memory* >ut e,en here cultural memory memory practices lac& an e+plicit political focus' they do e+press a society4s need for temporal anchorin hen in the a&e of the information re,olution and an e,er/increasin time/space compression' the relationship amon past' present and future is bein transformed beyond reconition*7 P*2F P*2F
HAP%" 2 &onumental &onumental 3eduction: Christo in "erlin -My purpose is to offer some reflections on the cateory o f the monumental itself' hich' it seems to be' is bein recoded in the contemporary conte+t of a ,oracious and e,er/ e+pandin memorial culture* My central concern' then' is the issue issue of the monumental in in relation to memory (;) Ho do e thin& the relation beteen monumentality as biness and the commemorati,e dimension of the monument? I ill relate three e,ents of the summer of @< to discuss the fate of monumentality and the monuments of our time hristo4s rappin of the "eichsta in >erlin' the debate about the planned >erlin monument for the murdered Kes of %urope' and Baner Baner in >ayreuth*7 P*30/3@ P*30/3@
I -In today4s ermany' ermany' redemption throuh memory is the oal* (;) "ecallin "obert Musil4s Musil4s obser,ation that there is nothin as in,isible as a monument' >erlin E and ith it all of this memorial/cra1ed ermany E is optin for in,isibility in,isibility** he more monuments there are' the more the past becomes beco mes in,isible' and the easier it is to foret redemption' thus' throuh forettin*7 P*32 .escribin the ,eilin -he pro+imity of monumental memory to monumental forettin as there for e,eryone to see* >eautification and pac&ain the past ere at sta&e both in hristo4s hristo4s pro6ect and in the aard/innin Holocaust monument* hristo and Keanne/laude turned a monument of erman history into myth* (;) rapped "eichsta' (;) as serenely and at times uncannily beautiful' its spatial monumentality both dissol,ed and accentuated by a lihtness of bein that contrasted star&ly ith the ,isual memory of the hea,y/set' no ,eiled architecture* (;) he parado+ is that in years past the real "eichsta may ha,e been more
in,isible E ,isually and historically E than the ,eiled buildin as no* eilin' eilin' after all' is not the same as pac&ain* (;) onceptually' the ,eilin of the "eichsta had another salutary effect it muted the ,oice of politics as usual (;) hus it opened up a space for reflection and contemplation as ell as for memory* memory* he transitoriness of the e,ent itself itself (;) as such that it hihlihted the temporality and historicity of the built space' the tenuous relationship beteen rememberin and forettin*7 P*3
II -he monumental is aesthetically suspect because it is tied to nineteenth/century bad taste' to &itsch and to mass culture* culture* It is politically suspect because it is seen as representati,e of nineteenth/century nationalisms and of tentieth/century tentieth/century totalitarianisms* totalitarianisms* It is socially suspect because it is the pri,ileed mode of e+pression of mass mo,ements and mass politics* It is ethically suspect because in its preference for biness it indules in the larer/than human' in the attempt to o,erhelm the indi,idual indi,idual spectator* It is psychoanalytically suspect because it is tied to narcissistic delusions of randeur and to imainary holeness* It is musically suspect because' ell' because of "ichard Baner*7 aner*7 P*3F/3
III -hus it as no coincidence that Heel placed architecture at the ,ery beinnins of art* Monumental architecture especially E thin& of the cult of obelis&s' pyramids' temples and memorial and burial toers/ seemed to uarantee permanence and to pro,ide the desired bular& aainst the speed/up of time' the shiftin rounds of urban space' and the transitoriness of modern life* life* "ichard Baner Baner as ,ery much of this nineteenth century' century' not aainst architecture' li&e the modernist >ataille' but unhesitatinly for itL not a ains oriins' but ,ery much in search of o f themL (;) in pursuit of a ne and permanent p ermanent culture that ould brin fruition hat he called the -art/orld/historical tas&7 (;) Baner4s Baner4s on monumental claim (;) is thus predicated on a orld in ruins' not in the future' but in the deep past* (;) The leitmotiv of architecture in ruins provides mythic closure to 4agner5s romantic 0uest: what is being built is always already a tomb, a memorial to Baner4s ner4s antipathy toard monumental as classicist classicist norm is failure and disaster. Ba rounded in his imain the monumental as ruin only' for only ruins have permanence *7 p*8@/8<
I Bhat then of the monumental today? -;the rappin of the "eichsta' hich can no be seen only in reproducible media imaes on postcards' /shirts' /shirts' coffee cups' and the Internet' is symptomatic of the fate of the monumental in our postmodern times it has mirated from the real into the imae' from
the material into the immaterial' and ultimately into the diiti1ed computer ba n&* (;) Monumentality today may all be in cyberspace and the information hihay*7 hihay*7 P*8D P*8D -Monumentality is ali,e and ell* Be may in fact ha,e to consider a monumentality of miniaturi1ation' for the orld ide eb is in principle the most iantic underta&in of our ae' as promisin to some and threatenin to others as monumentalism has e,er been* (;) !nly the future ill tell hether it as orth bein seduced*7 P*8D/8F P*8D/8F
HAP%" 3 The 6oids of "erlin I -he trope of the city as boo& or as te+t has e+isted as lon e ha,e had a modern city literature* here is nothin particularly postmodern about it* !n the other hand' one may ant to as& hy this notion of the city as sin and te+t assumed such critical mass in the architectural discourse of the @D0s and @F0s' @F 0s' aruably the hih time of an architectural obsession ith semiotics' rhetorics' and codins that underrote much of the debate about architectural postmodernism* (;) he notion of a city as sin' hoe,er' is as pertinent as before' thouh perhaps more no in a pictorial and imaistic rather than a te+tual sense* (;) oday it is the tourist rather than the flaneur to hom the ne city culture ants to appeal E e,en e ,en as it fears the tourist4s underside' the displaced and illeal mirant*7 P*<0 P*<0
II here is perhaps no other ma6or Bestern Bestern city that bears the mar&s of tentieth/century history as intensely and self/consciously as >erlin* >erlin* his city te+t as been ritten' erased' and reritten throuhout that ,iolent century (says Huyssen)*
III -he notion of >erlin as a ,oid is more than a metaphor' and it is not 6ust a transitory condition* It does carry ca rry historical connotations*7 P*<8 P*<8 -All of Best Best >erlin itself alays appeared as a ,oid on %astern %uropean maps Best Best >erlin of the old Bar as the hole in the %aster %uropean cheese* c heese* (;) Bhen the Ball came don' >erlin added another chapter to its narrati,e of ,oids' a chapter that brouht bac& shados of the past and spoo&y re,enants*7 P* << -Indeed' the city as center is far from becomin obsolete* obsolete* >ut as center' the city is increasinly affected and structured structured by our culture media of imaes* In the mo,e from the the city as reional or national center of production to the city as international center o f
communications' media and ser,ices' the ,ery imae of the city itself becomes central to its success in a lobally competiti,e orld*7 P*C0
I Irrele,ant details' really* really*
-"il&e once said that e,erythin e,erythin is already there* Be only must see it and protect it* Be must de,elop a feel for places' streets' and houses hich need our support*7 P*C<
I !rani1ed oids he >erlin Museum (@C2) and the Keish Museum (200@)* ->y lea,in this in/beteen space ,oid' the museum4s architecture forecloses the possibility of re/harmoni1in erman/Keish erman/Keish history alon the discredited models of symbiosis or assimilation* assimilation* >ut it also forecloses the opposite ,ie that sees the the Holocaust as the ine,itable telos of erman history* history* Keish life has been fundamentally altered by the Holocaust' but it has not stopped* he ,oid thus becomes a space nurturin memory and reflection for Ke and for ermans* It4s ,ery presence points to an absence that can ne,er be o,ercome' a rupture that cannot be healed' and that can certainly not be filled ith museal stuff* (;) he ,oid ill alays be there in the minds of the spectators crossin the brides that tra,erse it as they mo,e throuh the e+hibition space* he spectators themsel,es ill mo,e constantly beteen the lines* !rani1ed around a ,oid ithout imaes' :ibes&ind4s architecture has become script* His buildin rites the discontinuous narrati,e that is >erlin' inscribes it physically into the ,ery mo,ement of the museum ,isitor' and yet opens a space for remembrance to be articulated and read beteen the lines*7 P*C ->ut then the ,ery articulation of this museal space demonstrates the architect4s aareness of the daners of monumentality hue as the e+pansion is' the spectator can ne,er see or e+perience it as a hole* >oth the ,oid inside and the buildin buildin percei,ed from the outside elude the totali1in totali1in a1e upon hich monumental monumental effects are predicated* Spatial monumentality is undercut in the ine,itably temporal apprehension of the buildin*7 p*C
HAP%" 8 After the 4ar: "erlin as Palimpsest A ,ery interestin interestin short chapter di,ided in four parts that has no 9uotations to be mar&ed simply because they ill not contribute to my Sebald studies* studies* he author here focuses on the buildin of the ne ith ith the old and the timid* timid* He directs his attention attention toards the mall installments of Potsdamer Potsdamer Plat1 as a central e+ample* He considers ,oids an opportunity opportunity rather than a neati,e thin hen the definitions of cities are in,ol,ed*
HAP%" < 7ear of &ice: The Times 30uare 8edevelopment his chapter is dedicated entirely to $e #or&* #or&* Also a ood read but 9uite irrele,ant in terms of hat I4m loo&in for* for* He taps into the .isney phobia that stri&es people in the city hen the rede,elopment of 82nd Street is concerned*
HAP%" C &emory 3ites in an 9!panded 7ield: The &emory Par in "uenos Aires II -I4m precisely interested in the ays in hich lobal dimensions intersect ith the national or the local in the construction construction of memory sites in the contemporary orld* he e+panded field I am tryin to construct thus in,ol,es the crossin of borders not only ith reard to artistic medium (rauss)' but also in relation to eoraphies' politics' and the discourses of traumatic memory themsel,es ($ora) (;) in a field altered by lobali1ation*7 P*D P*D
II >rief introduction to the the Memory Par& constructed in 200@* He analy1es ho the lealofficial discourse employed to ma&e amends to e,ents happened durin the .irty Bar Bar ha,e much to do ith Holocaust discourse* -hus from the ,ery beinnin of the official documentation of the dirty ar aed by the military 6unta on its on population' the memory of the Holocaust has played an official collection of important role in the Argentinean discourse. he title of the first official testimony' testimony' published in @F8 by !$A.%P' the Arentine $ational ommission of the .isappeared' as Nunca as Nunca Más ($e,er Aain)' an e+plicit and emphatic reference to Holocaust discourse* (;) And it is no coincidence that the scholarly memory debate emerent since the mid @0s has dran time and aain on scholars of the Holocaust and has ta&en many of its cues from the international debate about Holocaust representations and commemoration* -Bhat I mean by producti,e inscription of Holocaust discourse is then simply this (;) the politics of Holocaust ommemoration (hat to remember' remember' ho to remember' hen to remember)' so prominent in the lobal media and in the countries of the northern transatlantic since the @F0s' has functioned li&e a motor eneri1in the discourses of memory elsehere* here is reason to to onder heter ithout the prominence prominence of Holocaust memory since the @F0s' most of the memory discourses the orld o,er ould be hat they are today*7 P*
HAP%" D oris 3alcedo5s &emory 3culpture: Unland: The Orphan’s Tunic Tunic -Memory Sculpture a &ind of sculpture that is not centered on spatial confiuration alone' but that poerfully inscribes a dimension of locali1able' e,en corporeal memory into the or&* his is an artistic practice practice that remains clearly distinct from the monument or the memorial* Its place is is in the museum or the the allery rather than in public space* Its addressee is the indi,idual beholder rather than the nation or the the community* community* In its handlin of materials and concepts' it relates to a specific tradition of installation art' and in its emphatic reliance on an e+periential e+pe riential dimension it is much less confined by eneric con,entions than either the monument or the memorial ould be* Monuments articulate official memory memory and their fate ine,itably is to be toppled or to become in,isible* in,isible* :i,ed memory' on the other hand' is alays located in indi,idual bodies' their e+perience and their pain' e,en hen it in,ol,es collecti,e' political or enerational memory* (;) In the or&s in 9uestion' hoe,er' the human body is ne,er forotten' thouh it is 6ust as absent and elusi,e as it ould be in any memory of the past*7 P*@@0/@@ P*@@0/@@@ @ -In these or&s' the material ob6ect is ne,er 6ust installation or sculpture in the traditional sense' but it is or&ed in such a ay that it articulates memory as a displacin of pa st into present' offerin a trace of a past that can be e+perienced and read by the ,ieer* (;) Its temporal sensibility is decidedly post/a,ant/arde* It fears not only the erasure of a specific (personal or political) past that may' may' of course' ,ary from artist to artistL it rather or&s aainst the erasure of pastness itself' hich' in its pro6ects' remains indissolubly lin&ed to the materiality of thins and bodies in time and space*7 P*@@@ P*@@@ -If classical sculpture captures the salient moment or crystalli1es an idea or ideal form from the flo of time' then Salcedo4s memory sculpture unloc&s itself only ithin the flo of time because temporality itself is inscribed inscribed into the or&* It dramati1es its materials' materials' yet holds on to an emphatic notion of or&' ob6ect' sculpture rather than d issol,in or& into performance* It embodies an e+panded temporality' and as ob6ect it it performs the process of memory*7 P*@@3 P*@@3 -learly' the or& defies a politics of redemption' and it suests defiance in an e,en broader sense defiance first of any direct representation of a self/perpetuatin self/perpetuatin ,iolence it ould be too leitimi1in to call politicalL defiance also of an increasinly spectaculari1ed culture of memory and its obsession ith public sites of commemoration' monuments' and memorials*7 P*@@ There is no end in sight for the cycle of violence that feeds on itself '(, lie Chronos devouring his own children in ;ree myth. P.//<
-Such art contains the drainin of space and hyperspace* It nurtures the basic human need to li,e in e+tended structures of temporality and in reconi1able space' hoe,er they may be orani1ed* And it enriches the beholder by drain us into its slo slo or& on the indissoluble relationship amon amon space' memory' memory' and bodily e+perience* (;) helps us not to foret (;) and' perhaps' to loo& ith fresh eyes at the ay e oursel,es neotiate space and memory in our on e,eryday li,es*7 P*@2@ P*@2@
HAP%" D f &ice and &imesis: 8eading 3piegelman with Adorno It ill not contribute to my Sebald studies or any understandin of mine for that matter*
HAP%" 8ewritings and =ew "eginnings: 4.;. 3ebald and the >iterature on on the Air 4ar 4ar.. -In this essay' I first suest some of the problems any such broader reassessment of postar erman literature ill encounter in the conte+t of postunification postunification cultural politics* Second' I dra of B** Sebald4s boo&/lenth essay The Air War and Literature (1999) hich lends itself particularly ell to a focus on the obsession ith endins and ne beinnins' that peculiar structure of repetition in postar erman erman literature and culture at lare* (;)Ultimately' (;)Ultimately' my readin of Sebald is meant as a case study of ho the reritin of a literary and historical past since @8< is tied to a structure of national memory that stretches across enerations and decades*7 P*@3/@80 P*@3/@80 8econfiguring >iterary History: 8estoration vs. /<1?
->riefly' ->riefly' the issue is this* he @0s ha,e itnessed an intensified attempt to i,e a more positi,e spin to the early postar years and the Adenauer Adenauer chancellorship* his ,ie challenes the left/liberal consensus of the pre,ious decades that the @<0s ere a period of restoration* (;) Perhaps it is a blessin that the 5ederal "epublic of ermany actually lac&s a stron foundational narrati,e* narrati,e* (;) As As .an .iner recently suested' suested' -Auschit17 has become somethin li&e a ci,ic reliion in ermany' and' for better or for orse' it may by no ha,e become a foundational myth of the ne %urope*7 P*@8@/@83 P*@8@/@83 Turning Tu rning Points
-In retrospecti,e' the insistence on ne beinnins E on Neuanfänge, on Neuanfänge, Nullpunkte, tabula rasa, We Wendepunkte, ndepunkte, and the li&e E appears a peculiarly erman obsession that lin&s such
seeminly different imainaries as those of @8<' @CF' and @F* he multiplicity of ne beinnins results not only from historical e,ents and constellations constellations but also from the absence of the &ind of foundational narrati,e that aullist 5rance created around the "esistance and that the %ast erman state produced ith its its doma of anti/fascism* anti/fascism* he parado+ of the Best Best erman case is that e,ery emphatic claim about a ne beinnin can also be read as a repetition*7 P*@88 P*@88 -ounterintuiti,e or not' there are se,eral methodoloical ad,an taes in focusin on the notion of repetition as a template throuh hich hich to loo& at postar erman literature at these crucial 6unctures* Such a focus a,oids meta/narrati,es meta/narrati,es of e,olution and political teleoloy* It a,oids locatin the phantasms phantasms of oriinal foundations and authenticity authenticity in the immediate postar period or at other turnin points in erman erman history* And most important' it allos us to lin& toether all those ho ould otherise remain separated by criteria of chronoloy' decades' enerations' or ritin strateies* As I sho later' Sebald4s Sebald4s memory te+ts re,ol,e crucially around such repetitions*7 P*@8< -Bhy this repetiti,e obsession hich is clearly fueled by much more than simply the a,ant/ ardist claim for the ne? here are specific historical and ideoloical e+planations for each one of these -turnin points7* >ut there is perhaps another dimension' one not so easily captured a dimension that has somethin to do ith the double/eded desire simultaneously to remember and to avoid the past, a habitus of memory politics that is more than simple forgetting or repression. '( Clearly this trauma is made up of many layers $ the feeling of the humiliation of total defeat, which is not erased by emphasi*ing that capitulation was also liberation@ the deep guilt feelings about the Holocaust, itself not a ;erman trauma but rather the trauma of its victims, which as such blocs desired normali*ation@ the e!perience of e!pulsion from the 9ast and the e!perience of the bombardment of ;erman cities, both of which have been used either to constitute the ;erman as victim in an Aufrechnungsdi Aufrechnungsdiskurs skurs,, a compensatory discourse of moral e0uity 'loo how we we suffered(, suffered(, or as a cathartic argument that retribution was ustified 'serves us rightB( with permanent implications for national identity and statehood. )My hypothesis is that at its deepest le,el the erman discourse of turnin points from @8< on can be read as a symptom of such multilayered traumatic e+periences' hich alays lea,e somethin unresol,ed and in need of further articulation* articulation* After e,ery turn' turn' it seems' the past returns only to enerate the desire for the ne+t turn* At the same time' this this repetiti,e dialectic beteen memory and forettin has not loc&ed erman public culture in the structure of fro1en melancholy* Since e,ery repetition differs from the last' there is mo,ement in public memory' a mo,ement not toard resolution or e,en redemption' but toard ac&noledment and reconition*7 P*@8C P*@8C 4riting and the Air 4ar 4ar
