Jakob-Fugger-Zentrum
Tyranny, Despotism, Violence - Barbara Stollberg-Rillinger in Augsburg
Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger in Augsburg
The International Visiting Professorship at the Jakob Fugger Centre offers students and teachers of the University of Augsburg as well as interested citizens the opportunity to experience internationally renowned personalities from politics, business, science and the arts in Augsburg. With lectures, seminars and discussions on central questions of our time, the International Visiting Professorship promotes exchange between lecturers, the University of Augsburg and the municipal community. The International Visiting Professorship is a joint initiative of the faculties of humanities, cultural studies, social sciences and the Jakob-Fugger-Zentrum.
For the summer semester of 2022, Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger, one of the most important historians for early modern history and expert of "the political", has accepted our invitation to hold the International Visiting Professorship. Her lectures in Augsburg will be focusing on the topic of "Tyranny, Despotism, Violence".
Trump, Bolsonaro, even more so Putin - the terms tyrant and despot are back in use. Current autocrats are thus placed in a millennia-old discourse. The question is: Are there structural parallels across epochs, from antiquity to the present day? Or is this a mere question of perspective? Is one man's tyrant another man's hero? And what role does the use and threat of physical violence play in this context? This will first be addressed using the example of the Prussian "soldier king" Frederick William I (Friedrich Wilhelm I), who described himself as a tyrant and was posthumously transformed by historians into the "educator of the German people to Prussianism", and then placed in a larger context.
Tyranny, Despotism, Violence - LECTURES AND WORKSHOPS
Admission is free of charge. The event will take place in compliance with the Covid-regulations in effect at the time. Please register via our homepage. The lectures will be held in German.
May 25th 2023, 6:30 p.m.
Frederick William I (Friedrich Wilhelm I) and the Prussian Myth
Location to be announced
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May 26th 2023, 10 a.m.
Workshop for Master's and PhD students: Tyranny and Despotism. Theories from Antiquity to the Present
Room 4046, Building D, Augsburg University
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June 29th 2023, 6:30 pm
Rituals of violence - the king as outsider
Rococo Hall of the Government of Swabia, Fronhof 10, 86152 Augsburg
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June 30th 2023, 10 a.m.
Workshop for Master's and PhD students: Theories on the social logic of violence
Room 4046, Building D, Augsburg University
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Recommended reading for the workshop:
André Krischer, Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger (Eds.), Tyrannen. Eine Geschichte von Caligula bis Putin, München ²2023.
Heinrich Popitz, Phänomene der Macht, ²Tübingen 1992.
Jan Philipp Reemtsma, Vertrauen und Gewalt. Versuch über eine besondere Konstellation der Modern, Hamburg 2008.
About the speaker
Barbara Stollberg-Rilinger
was Professor of the Early Modern History at the University of Münster from 1997 to 2021, where she led the Collaborative Research Centre "Symbolische Kommunikation und gesellschaftliche Wertesysteme" (Symbolic Communication and Social Value Systems) and the Cluster of Excellence "Religion and Politics", among others. She has been Rector of the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin since September 2018. She is a member of various academies and a Fellow of the British Academy. Her field of research is the constitutional, political and cultural history of Europe from the 16th to the 18th century, especially of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. Her main focus is on rituals and procedures, ceremonies, metaphors and symbols.
Latest book publications: Rituale, Frankfurt/Main 2013; Maria Theresia. Die Kaiserin in ihrer Zeit. Eine Biographie. München 2017, 5th ed.. 2018 (Engl. transl. 2021); Tyrannen. Eine Geschichte von Caligula bis Putin (ed. together with André Krischer), München 2022.