Kia Lindroos

I am examining the concept of ‘Violence/Gewalt’ in Benjamin’s essay by paying attention to its temporality and various interdisciplinary layers and forms of critique that are embedded in this single conception. I will suggest that in “Toward a Critique of Violence” essay, the violence is not criticized as such. There is no violence ‘as such’, instead, the use and understanding of violence is mostly contextual. In Benjamin’s essay, there are various political, historical, philosophical, and conceptual reflections that are attached under the temporal ‘umbrella’ of the concept of power/violence. The different conceptions of violence (Gewalt) in Benjamin’s essay from 1921 are for instance state power/violence, mythical violence, divine violence, juridical power, structural power, and sovereign power. All these conceptions can be actualized in our present time, taken account the heterogeneity of power/violence is apparent in 2020’s conflicts and wars.I am proceeding by firstly discussing the background of the essay by discussing Benjamin shortly with Max Weber and John Dewey. Next, I am proceeding with conceptual reading and will point out the different connections and temporality that are embedded in Benjamin’s concept of Gewalt in the 1921 essay. In the end of my chapter, I discuss shortly Benjamin’s philosophy of language and will point out why the connection between mimesis, language and divine power provide an essential link in understanding the temporal character of the violence.

In discussing the cultural history of the 19th century, Walter Benjamin diagnosed the emergence of the modern novel and its form of narration as the sign of a fracturing experience. The split in experience is related to the scattering of a homogeneous idea of space and time, constituted especially during the Enlightenment and in the German historicism. Benjamin's claim reflected the fracturing temporality of modern communities as well as the transformations in the understanding of the meaning of tradition. Here, I begin by discussing Benjamin's conceptions of experience and memory in detail. Secondly, I consider his ideas on history in the framework of challenging the new forms of narration. In the end, I consider the loss of a unified community, especially by indicating ways in which the after-modern community reflects the relationship between aesthetics and politics in Jean-François Lyotard's thought. Key Words: Benjamin • community • experience • history • Lyotard • memory • narrative • remembrance • time.

Lindroos constructs an alternative interpretation on history, time, politics and art, approached through the moment of the Now (Jetztzeit). In the first section, she elaborates the critique of chronologic-linear way of understanding history. Through a close reading of Benjamin's "Work of Art" essay, the second section examines the problems of origins, authenticity and traditions of art through the ideas of artistic avant-garde and politicization of aesthetics. The end of the book discusses the concept of image and the new images as an Image-Space (Bildraum) of action.