Walter Benjamin and the Aesthetics of Change

by Sylvia D Hall-Ellis (Editor)

Overview

Following the spirit of Benjamin's Arcades Project, thisbook acts as a kaleidoscope of change in the 21st century, tracing its different reflections in the international contemporary while seeking to understand individual/collective reactions to change through a series of creative methodologies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781349368792
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	01/20/2010
Edition description:	1st ed. 2010
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	5.51(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.02(d)

About the Author

CLAES BELFRAGE is Lecturer in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Swansea, UK
GRAEME GILLOCH is Reader in the Department of Sociology, University of Lancaster, UK
RENATE HOLUB is Director of Interdisciplinary Studies at University of California, Berkeley, US
ELIZABETH HOWIE is Assistant Professor of Art History in the Visual Arts Department of Coastal Carolina University, US
PETRA HROCH is a PhD student in the Department of Sociology at the University of Alberta, Canada
ESTHER LESLIE is Professor in Political Aesthetics in the School of English and Humanities at Birkbeck, University of London, UK
ANCA PUSCA is Lecturer in the Department of Politics at Goldsmiths, University of London, UK
ZOË THOMPSON is a PhD student in the Department of Sociology at the University of Birmingham, UK
KONSTANTINOS VASSILIOU is a PhD student at the University of Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France
ROLANDO VASQUEZ is Assistant Professor in Sociology at the Roosevelt Academy, Utrecht University, Netherlands

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations vii

Acknowledgements viii

List of Contributors ix

Aesthetics of Change: An Introduction Anca M. Pusca 1

Chapter 1 Towards a Global Space of Democratic Rights: On Benjamin, Gramsci, and Polanyi Renate Holub 10

Chapter 2 Erasing the Traces, Tracing Erasures: Cultural Memory and Belonging in Newcastle/Gateshead, UK Zoë Thompson 55

Chapter 3 'Sunshine and Noir': Benjamin, Kracauer and Roth Visit the 'White Cities' Graeme Gilloch 82

Chapter 4 Liquidation and Shattering: Aesthetics and Politics in Cold Climates Esther Leslie 95

Chapter 5 Fashion and Its 'Revolutions' in Walter Benjamin's Arcades Petra Hroch 108

Chapter 6 Proof of the Forgotten: A Benjaminian Reading of Daguerre's Two Views of the Boulevard du Temple Elizabeth Howie 127

Chapter 7 Commodity Display and the Phantasmagoria of Modernity: Exploring Walter Benjamin's Critique of History Rolando Vázquez 144

Chapter 8 The Aura of Art After the Advent of the Digital Konstantinos Vassiliou 158

Chapter 9 Towards a Benjaminist Political Economy Claes Belfrage 171

Conclusion Anca M. Pusca 193

Index 198