The Acoustical Unconscious: From Walter Benjamin to Alexander Kluge

Robert Ryder

Published by De Gruyter 2022

The Acoustical Unconscious

From Walter Benjamin to Alexander Kluge

Robert Ryder

Volume 32 in the series Interdisciplinary German Cultural Studies

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110733006

Overview
Contents

About this book

Now in Paperback

Is there an acoustical equivalent to Walter Benjamin’s idea of the optical unconscious? In the 1930s, Benjamin was interested in how visual media expand our optical perception: the invention of the camera allowed us to see images and details that we could not consciously perceive before. This study argues that Benjamin was also concerned with how acoustical media allow us to “hear otherwise,” that is, to listen to sound structures previously lost to the naked ear. Crucially, they help sensitize us to the discursive sonority of words, which Benjamin was already alluding to in his autobiographical work. In five chapters that range in scope from Tieck’s Blonde Eckbert, which Benjamin once called his locus classicus of his theory of forgetting, to Alexander Kluge’s films and short texts, where he develops what he calls “sound perspectives,” this monograph discusses how the acoustical unconscious enriches our understanding of different media, from the written word to radio and film. As the first book-length study of Benjamin’s linguistic, cultural-historical, and media-theoretical reflections on sound, this book will be particularly relevant to students and scholars of both German studies and sound studies.

Author / Editor information

Robert G. Ryder, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	I
Acknowledgements Publicly Available Download PDF	VII
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	IX
List of Abbreviations Publicly Available Download PDF	XI
Introduction: Hearing Otherwise Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1 Walter Benjamin’s Shell-Shock: Sounding the Acoustical Unconscious Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	28
2 Of Birds and Barks: Listening in on the Forgotten in Freud, Benjamin, and Tieck Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	66
3 Voices Carry: Benjamin and Arnheim on Radio Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	102
4 Glimpsing the World through Our Ears: Günter Eich and the Acoustical Unconscious Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	155
5 Clatter in Kracauer and Kluge: Politicizing the Acoustical Unconscious Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	192
Conclusion: Toward a Genealogy of the Acoustical Unconscious Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	239
Works Cited Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	249
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	261

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: De Gruyter
Audience: Scholars interested in Sound Studies, German Studies, Benjamin Studies, Cultural Theory, Media Theory, Literary studies
Pages
- Front matter: 10
- Main content: 265
Illustrations
- Illustrations: 5
- Coloured Illustrations: 1
Keywords: Unconscious; hearing; Benjamin; German media

eBook

Published: February 21, 2022
ISBN: 9783110733006

Hardcover

Published: March 7, 2022
ISBN: 9783110737776

Paperback

Published: October 24, 2023
ISBN: 9783111356877