Abstract
In this chapter, the concept of the paradoxical open gestalt of violence is unfolded by describing an alternative approach to research on violence, which combines the phenomenological ontology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, particularly his notion of the term flesh with the transrational ontology elaborated by Wolfgang Dietrich. The aim is to overcome a Marxist view of emancipatory politics that focuses on the economic base of society and also a postmodern perspective referring to Wittgenstein and understanding the limits of language as the limits of the world. By shifting the locus of authority into the inner self, this contribution is the attempt to integrate an emancipatory aspect into violence research and empower the individual who is the experiencer of violence.
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Notes
- 1.
Gestalt goes back to Gestalt Therapy and means shaping a meaningful whole and is here also based on Merleau-Ponty’s thoughts. He describes gestalt as “a whole that does not reduce itself to the sum of the parts- a negative, exterior definition- A designation of the Gestalt by contrast with the domain of the in itself in which one is installed (…).” (Merleau-Ponty 1968, 204–205).
- 2.
See for this purpose in particular the work of the Bielefelder Schule [Eng. Bielefeld School] of Wilhelm Heitmeyer since 1994.
- 3.
“Gewalt schafft Chaos, und Ordnung schafft Gewalt. Dieses Dilemma ist unauflösbar” (Original in German in Sofsky 2005, 10).
- 4.
“Human expressivity is capable of objectivation, that is, it manifests itself in products of human activity that are available both to their producers and to other men as elements of a common world. Such objectivations serve as more or less enduring indices of the subjective processes of their producers, allowing their availability to extend beyond the face-to-face situation in which they can be directly apprehended” (Berger and Luckmann 1991, 49).
- 5.
“Selbst das Widerfahrnis der Gewalt in seiner sinnlichen Unmittelbarkeit, so lässt sich geltend machen, ist in gewisser Weise durch sprachliche Praktiken vorstrukturiert” (Original in German in Kuch 2014, 72).
- 6.
On this subject, see Norbert Koppensteiner’s chapter (Chap. 4) in the current volume.
- 7.
“Die Gewalt spricht nicht” (Original in German, Reemtsma 2002).
- 8.
- 9.
On this subject, see Shamal Amin und Nigar Hasib’ chapter (Chap. 18) in the current volume.
- 10.
For further details, visit Lalish Theater (2017).
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Gulowski, R. (2018). On the Flesh of Violence: The (Phenomenological) Dilemma in Researching Violence and Its Transrational Transformation. In: Echavarría Alvarez, J., Ingruber, D., Koppensteiner, N. (eds) Transrational Resonances . Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-70616-0_9
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