Towards an Altered Subject. Walter Benjamin's Ethnolinguistic Studies

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My DPhil research project focuses on a mode of thinking which I refer to as presence of mind, Geistesgegenwart, a term rooted in German philosophy. It is an idea that is prevalent in the work of the thinker, writer and critic Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), the towering figure in 20th-century German intellectual history. Geistesgegenwart has a central place in Benjamin's thought (see Duttlinger, 2022) as a stance able to disrupt our habitual thought process by making us see the objects of our attention differently. Sitting at the intersection of linguistic and cultural theory and philosophy of mind, my research focuses on an underexplored area of Benjamin's intellectual life that has majorly influenced his thought: his sustained and wide-ranging anthropological interest in indigenous languages. Particularly noteworthy are Benjamin's studies of Mexican studies and his long-lasting preoccupation with the Nahuan languages, which have hitherto gone unnoticed. My thesis is the first study which shows that Benjamin's concept of Geistesgegenwart emerged from his sustained engagement with non-western languages, on which he first embarked as a student and which he continued throughout his later life. Benjamin's language studies play a significant role in his philological and anthropological thought, which is considered both his subject and his methodology (see Duttlinger/Morgan/Phelan, 2012). My project will complement this research by contributing a deeper and more nuanced understanding of the importance of Benjamin's engagement with foreign languages. His active engagement with indigenous languages and cultures is particularly relevant for his interest in the connections between experience and cognition (see Weber, 2010).My project will contribute to the understanding of Benjamin's language acquisition as an approach to a worldview that transcends western paradigms. This opens up Benjamin research to a new non-European audience and raises the following questions:1. How does Benjamin's multilingualism shape and facilitate his anthropological, transcultural approach?2. How does Benjamin's knowledge gained from non-European language acquisition enhance his understanding of the human mind beyond western paradigms?3. What conclusions can be drawn from Benjamin's radical reassessment of the subject-object relation for his theory of Geistesgegenwart?During my first year on the project, I uncovered Benjamin's ethnolinguistic studies and recognised their far-reaching significance for his work. I paid particular attention to Benjamin's handwritten notes and correspondence, held at the Walter Benjamin archive in Berlin, as they provide valuable insight into Benjamin's methodology and the development of his thought. My archive work opened up new perspectives and lines of enquiry, on the basis of which I will articulate a systematic analysis of Benjamin's reinterpretation of the subject-object in his theory of language and specifically how he understands the position of the speaker. Furthermore, I examined the secondary literature with regard to my premise, resulting in a first, comprehensive survey of relevant research. On this basis, I was able to pinpoint Benjamin's ethnolinguistic studies and their philosophical implications of linguistic and cultural diversity as a gap in the current research. In my dissertation, I trace how Benjamin's thought and method are subject to change through the perspectives that emerge from his knowledge of foreign languages. I open up Benjamin towards a hitherto overlooked intellectual discourse on ethnology to shed light on the significance of non-western languages and cultures for 20th-century intellectual history. Beyond Benjamin studies, my project has the potential to contribute to a deeper understanding of how European modernist thinkers reconceived of subject-object relations beyond western paradigms.