In this collaboratively authored work, five distinguished sociologists develop an ambitious theoretical model of "cultural trauma"--and on this basis build a new understanding of how social groups interact with emotion to create new and binding understandings of social responsibility. Looking at the "meaning making process" as an open-ended social dialogue in which strikingly different social narratives vie for influence, they outline a strongly constructivist approach to trauma and apply this theoretical model in a series of extensive case studies, including the Nazi Holocaust, slavery in...

Taking a "cultural pragmatic" approach to meaning, the contributors suggest a new way of looking at the continuum that stretches between ritual and strategic action. They do so by developing, for the first time, a model of "social performance." This volume offers the first systematic and analytical framework that transforms the metaphor into a social theory and applies it to a series of facinating large-scale social and cultural processes--from September 11 and the Clinton/Lewinsky Affair, to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Willy Brandt's famous "kneefall" before the...

This book deals with triumphant and tragic heroes, with victims and perpetrators as archetypes of the Western imagination. A major recent change in Western societies is that memories of triumphant heroism-for example, the revolutionary uprising of the people-are increasingly replaced by the public remembrance of collective trauma of genocide, slavery and expulsion. The first part of the book deals with the heroes and victims and explores the social construction of charisma and its inevitable decay. Part 2 focuses on a paradigm case of the collective trauma of perpetrators: German national...

This book proposes a theory of collective and national identity based on culture and language rather than power and politics. Applying this to what he calls Germany's "axial age," Bernhard Giesen shows how the codes of nineteenth-century German identity in turn became those of the divided Germany between 1945 and 1989. The identity he describes derives from the ideas of German intellectuals, from the uprooted romantic poets to the influential German mandarins, and was borne by the newly emerging bourgeoisie.

This book proposes a theory of collective and national identity based on culture and language rather than power and politics. Applying this to what he calls Germany's "axial age," Bernhard Giesen shows how the codes of nineteenth-century German identity in turn became those of the divided Germany between 1945 and 1989. The identity he describes derives from the ideas of German intellectuals, from the uprooted romantic poets to the influential German mandarins, and was borne by the newly emerging bourgeoisie.

This book deals with triumphant and tragic heroes, with victims and perpetrators as archetypes of the Western imagination. A major recent change in Western societies is that memories of triumphant heroism-for example, the revolutionary uprising of the people-are increasingly replaced by the public remembrance of collective trauma of genocide, slavery and expulsion. The first part of the book deals with the heroes and victims and explores the social construction of charisma and its inevitable decay. Part 2 focuses on a paradigm case of the collective trauma of perpetrators: German national...

A collection of original articles that explore social aspects of the phenomenon of icon. Having experienced the benefits and realized the limitations of so called 'linguistic turn', sociology has recently acknowledged a need to further expand its horizons.

Dieser Band unterrichtet uber die wichtigsten soziologischen Problembereiche. Besonderes Gewicht liegt dabei auf der Einbeziehung sozial- und kulturanthropologischer Erkenntnisse in die soziologische Interpretation.

Kollektive Identität ist zu einem aktuellen Thema geworden. Als nationale, kulturelle, regionale und ethnische Identität bestimmt dieses Thema nicht nur die politische Rhetorik, sondern auch die Ziele alter und neuer sozialer Bewegungen, begründet politische Konflikte und territoriale Ansprüche, gibt Minderheiten das Recht zum Widerstand gegen Mehrheiten und fordert fraglose Solidarität auch jenseits von Verwandtschaft und persönlicher Bekanntschaft. Giesen versucht einerseits, allgemeine theoretische Überlegungen und Typologien vorzustellen, die sich auf ein breites Band von...

A collection of original articles that explore social aspects of the phenomenon of icon. Having experienced the benefits and realized the limitations of so called 'linguistic turn', sociology has recently acknowledged a need to further expand its horizons.