Walter Benjamin und das Erleben in der Kindheit

Die Autorin zeigt anhand der Interpretation des Textstücks „Schmetterlingsjagd“ aus Walter Benjamins „Berliner Kindheit um neunzehnhundert“ welche pädagogischen Einsichten gewonnen werden können. Dabei zeigt sich, dass das Kind einen mimetischen Zugang zum Schmetterling einnimmt, um ihn fangen zu können und ihn für seine Sammlung zu sezieren. D.h. der kindliche Zugang des Sich-Ähnlich-Machens wird von Benjamin dialektisch erinnert: er ist nicht nur ein sanftes Sich-Nähern an die Gegenstände der Welt, sondern unterliegt bereits in der Kindheit einer instrumentellen Verwendung. Erst diese sichert, dass das Kind seinen Platz in der Gesellschaft wird finden können. (DIPF/Autorin)

Affective disruption: Walter Benjamin and the 'history' of Ireland's industrial schools

What role do organizations play in writing history? In this paper, I address the part played by organizations in the enactment of large-scale violence, and focus on the ways in which the resulting histories come to be written. Drawing on the case of Ireland's industrial schools, I demonstrate how such accounts can act to serve the interests of those in power, effectively silencing and marginalizing weaker people. A theoretical lens that draws on ideas from Walter Benjamin and Judith Butler is helpful in understanding this; the concept of 'affective disruption' enables an exploration of how people's experiences of organizational violence can be reclaimed from the past, and protected in a continuous remembrance. Overall, this paper contributes a new perspective on the writing of organizational histories, particularly in relation to the enactment of violence. 

Hui and Walter's latent-class model extended to estimate diagnostic test properties from surveillance data: a latent model for latent data

Diagnostic test sensitivity and specificity are probabilistic estimates with far reaching implications for disease control, management and genetic studies. In the absence of 'gold standard' tests, traditional Bayesian latent class models may be used to assess diagnostic test accuracies through the comparison of two or more tests performed on the same groups of individuals. The aim of this study was to extend such models to estimate diagnostic test parameters and true cohort-specific prevalence, using disease surveillance data. The traditional Hui-Walter latent class methodology was extended to allow for features seen in such data, including (i) unrecorded data (i.e. data for a second test available only on a subset of the sampled population) and (ii) cohort-specific sensitivities and specificities. The model was applied with and without the modelling of conditional dependence between tests. The utility of the extended model was demonstrated through application to bovine tuberculosis surveillance data from Northern and the Republic of Ireland. Simulation coupled with re-sampling techniques, demonstrated that the extended model has good predictive power to estimate the diagnostic parameters and true herd-level prevalence from surveillance data. Our methodology can aid in the interpretation of disease surveillance data, and the results can potentially refine disease control strategies.

Walter Heissig, Rüdiger, Schott, Die Heutige Bedeutung Oraler traditionen. IHRE Archivierung, Publikation und index-Erschießung

The book under review is the publication of 28 contributions to a workshop which has tak en place in St. Augustin, near Bonn, in November 1995. This was attended by a large number of proeminent scholars, gathered around the commonly felt concern for the need to preserve “the oral traditions of all kinds” (p. 26). The papers, written in German (11), in English (16) and in French (1), are introduced by the organisers Walter Hessig and Rüdiger Schott in both German and English.

Um drama da crítica: Oscar Wilde, Walter Pater e Matthew Arnold, lidos por Fernando Pessoa

Tese de doutoramento, Estudos da Literatura e da Cultura (Teoria da Literatura), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Letras, 2014

On the conservatism of post-Jungian criticism: competing concepts of the symbol in Freud, Jung and Walter Benjamin

The renewed interest in analytical psychology by academics working in the humanities has led to the emergence of a post-Jungian field of cultural criticism, at the theoretical core of which stands Jung's theory of symbolism. This article examines the centrality of symbolism to both Freud and Jung's psychology and explains how the differing concepts of the symbol lead to their divergent theories of interpretation in psychology and art criticism. Acknowledging the advantages of Jung's more expansive account of the symbol, it argues that Walter Benjamin's critical engagement with Jung nonetheless provides a useful correction to the problematic conservatism inherent to his concept of the symbol and its contemporary application.