International Conference: Antisemitism and the Emergence of Sociological Theory Sun November 2 - Mon November 3, 2008
School of Arts, Histories and Cultures, The University of Manchester
Hosted by the Centre for Jewish Studies
In cooperation with the British Sociological Association Theory Study Group and the Leo Baeck Institute, London
Modern antisemitism and modern sociological theory not only emerged in the same period: as much as both discourses might have been antagonistic, they also overlapped and complemented each other. This international conference will explore and test the hypothesis that the emergence of sociology and that of antisemitism are related while at the same time competing, or even antagonistic phenomena. This hypothesis is based on two observations: first, the discipline of sociology is understood to have emerged as a liberal response to the crisis phenomena of modern society, aiming at its consolidation and, to varying degrees, its defence; second, modern antisemitism is likewise understood to be a travesty of a social theory responding to the same type of society, offering in its phantasmagorias of the Jew and Jewification an explanation of its deficiencies and crises while also (more often than not) being antagonistic to the social-democratic labour movement. Contributors will explore:
- what sociologists (or those who helped constitute the discipline) had to say on antisemitism and the Jewish Question;
- how antisemites made use of sociological categories; and
- what antisemites on the one hand, sociologists on the other (and those who were both), had to say about subjects that were concerns of either group, including money, usury, modernity, work and labour, individualism, community, society, social reform, socialism, state and culture, religion, the spirit of capitalism, capitalist development.
Whether and to what extent the need to respond to, but also the inevitability of reflecting some of the concerns of contemporary antisemites, have had an impact on the shape of classical sociology has until now never been researched systematically. This international conference is expected to deepen significantly the debate on antisemitisms relation to, and stakes in modern social thought.
The conference will also widen the perspective on the topic beyond France and Germany, which serve almost universally as the starting points of discussions of both antisemitism and the emergence of sociology. Speakers from the UK, USA, France, Germany, Israel, Hungary, Switzerland, Poland, Finland and Argentina will relate critical and cutting edge explorations of the established French-German canon of sociological founding fathers to the specific and differing developments in Argentina, Italy, Hungary, Poland and the USA. The conference will challenge the ways the history and nature of sociology, and more generally modern thinking about state, individual and society are discussed, taking what conventionally may be considered to be a partial aspect or area of study within this field (antisemitism; the Jewish question) as the central perspective from where to illuminate its general emergence and development.
Sunday November 2 and Monday November 3, 2008
Location: The Martin Harris Centre for Dance and Drama, Oxford Road
Sunday, November 2, 17.00 Public lecture: Prof. Moishe Postone, Chicago University, 'History, the Holocaust, and the Left'
Speakers:
- Prof. Robert Fine, Warwick, 'Marx and the critique of antisemitism'
- Prof. Richard H. King, Nottingham, 'Again American Exceptionalism? Sociology and Antisemitism in Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century America'
- Prof. Roland Robertson, University of Aberdeen, 'Evil Without Guilt: Can all Evil be Explained (Away) by "Sociological" Means?'
- Prof. Michal Bodemann, University of Toronto, 'In cold Admiration: Werner Sombart, the Jews and classical German Sociology'
- Prof. Jonathan Judaken, Memphis, 'Talcott Parsons' "The Sociology of Modern Antisemitism": Anti-antisemitism, Ambivalent Liberalism, and the Sociological Imagination'
- Prof. Chad Alan Goldberg, University of Wisconsin/ Jerusalem, 'Jews and Modernity in Classical Sociological Theory'
- Prof. Daniel Lvovich, Universidad Nacional de General Sarmiento Buenos Aires, 'Gino Germani, Argentinian Sociology and the Study of Antisemitism'
- Dr. Amos Morris-Reich, Haifa, 'Epistemology and Rhetoric: Responses to Antisemitism in Franz Boas, Georg Simmel, and Arthur Ruppin'
- Dr. Werner Bonefeld, Lecturer in Politics, York University, 'Antisemitism and the (modern) critique of capitalism'
- Dr. Gary A. Abraham, Allegany, 'Revisiting Max Weber and the Jewish Question'
- Dr. Marcel Stoetzler, University of Manchester, 'Antisemitism, the social question, and the formation of sociological theory'
- Dr. Regina Schleicher, Lecturer in Romance Languages and Literatures, University of Frankfurt/M, 'The use of sociological categories in antisemitic texts from France and Germany, 1880-1905; results of a discourse analysis'
- Dr. Olli-Pekka Moisio, University of Jyväskylä, 'Max Horkheimer and Leo Löwenthal on Fascism and Antisemitism'
- Dr. Christine Achinger, Lecturer in German Studies, Warwick University, title tbc
- Dr. Rainer Niklaus Egloff, Researcher in history at the Collegium Helveticum Zürich, 'Ludwig Fleck, Antisemitism and the Sociology of Science'
- Mathias Berek, Leipzig, 'Moritz Lazarus, Georg Simmel, and Antisemitism'
- Dr. Sebastien Mosbah-Natanson, University of Quebec, Montreal, 'Durkheimian Sociology and Antisemitism around 1900: the case of Célestin Bouglé' tbc
- Dr. David Seymour, Lancaster, title tbc
- Dr. John Abbott, Lecturer in History, University of Illinois, 'Social Questions, Christian Ethics and Antisemitic Imagery: The Case of Georg Ratzinger'
- Kati Vörös, Budapest/ University of Chicago/Mainz, 'The "Jewish Question", Hungarian Sociology, and the Normalization of Antisemitism, 1900-1920'
- Tim Buchen, Berlin, 'Adoptions of "Antisemitism" and the Place of Jews in Society: the Cracow Case; Gumplowicz and his reception by Morawski'
- Dr. Malgorzata Mazurek, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Zentrum fuer Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam, 'From Znaniecki to Bauman: Polish Sociology vis-à-vis antisemitism before and after the Holocaust'
Discussant:
- Prof. Robert Fine, 'History the Holocaust and the left'
Contact marcel.stoetzler@manchester.ac.uk
Conference Booking Form
You can download the conference booking form and programme using the links below:
- Conference Booking Form (Microsoft Word, 54 KB)
- Conference Programme (PDF, 30 KB)
- Absracts (PDF, 121 KB)