Critical Theories of Antisemitism

Entanglements between Antisemitism and colonial Racisms in Genealogical Perspective

9:15 am – 12:30 pm, Saturday June 20, Panel 5 : Antisemitism and Racism: Proximity, Differences, Intersections, Entanglements, Definitional Issues (in English)

Antisemitism and Colonial Racisms have often been studied independent of each other. Especially in Germany Antisemitism is even regarded as fundamentally distinct from other forms of Racism. My panel contribution aims instead to highlight the fundamental interconnections between different racist discourses. Therefore, I go back into European history revealing some traces of historical intersections between Anti-Judaism (resp. Anti-Semitism) and other Racisms from the Middle Ages up to the Modern Area. Right from the beginning, anti-Judaic stereotypes developed not isolated from other proto-racial discourses, applied for example to Saracens, Turks, Mongols and different kinds of ‘monstrous’ people. And conversely, during the colonial period, Ani-Judaistic discourses were of special importance for the formation of different types of Colonial Racisms. European missionaries and travellers transferred their notions of the Jewish “Other” for example to Indigenous People, Black Americans or Muslims. Others, such as the German anti-Semite Wilhelm Marr, translated their experience of racial segregation from the United States into a radicalized Antisemitism in Germany, so that Anti-Black Racisms itself became relevant for the shift from anti-Judaism to Antisemitism. Nevertheless, Jews were also imagined as hegemonic colonizers of European nations, oppressing especially the Germans. In summary, an intersectional perspective opens up options for perceiving Antisemitism with stronger consideration of its interrelations with Colonial Racisms, as well as in its symbolic function for colonization processes. This approach hopes to strengthen the potential to move away from competitive thinking between different groups affected by racism towards more mutual solidarity.

Claudia Bruns has held the Chair of “Historical Anthropology and Gender Studies” at the Department of “Cultural History and Theory” at the Humboldt University Berlin since 2013. She studied History, Philosophy, German Language and Literature at the Universities of Hamburg and Dublin and holds a phd in Medieval and Modern History. Her prominent work operates at the intersection of Cultural Studies & Historical Sciences, Gender & Racism Studies. She is associated board member of the “Selma Stern Center for Jewish Studies Berlin” and was, among other things, spokesperson for the DFG-Research Training Group “Gender as a Category of Knowledge” at Humboldt-University Berlin. Her research focuses on European Cultural History, Gender Studies, Racism and Antisemitism Studies, Memory of the Holocaust, History of the Body and (Homo)Sexuality, of European Borders and Boundaries, Discourse Analysis and Postcolonial Theory. With her monograph « Politics of Eros, » in which she examines the phenomenon of the ‘Männerbund’ from the German Empire to National Socialism she contributed not only to the history of masculinity, the body and homosexuality around 1900, but also to the analysis of pre-fascist movements and Antisemitism. A cultural-historical perspective on the relationship between race and space is the focus of another volume, which she edited during her time as a guest professor at the “Center for Cultural Studies” at the University of Trier. Early on, Claudia Bruns was interested in bringing transfer-analytical, intersectional, and postcolonial perspectives into the history of racism. This can be read, for instance, in the conceptual introduction to the volume “Wissen – Transfer – Differenz”, which analytically distinguishes three dimensions of entanglement and transfer processes in racial discourses. The racialized and gendered borders of Europe’s “political collective body” are the focus of another of Claudia’s monographs she is currently working on as well as on a volume on the Germany`s second “Historian Dispute”. Publications among others: Antisemitism and Colonial Racisms. Genealogical Perspectives, in: Colonialism and the Jews in German History. From the Middle Ages to the Twentieth Century, ed. by S. Vogt (London, 2022), pp. 25–55; Wissen – Transfer – Differenz. Transnationale und interdiskursive Verflechtungen von Rassismen ab 1700, ed. with M. M. Hampf (Wallstein, 2018); How Gay is Germany? Homosexuality, Politics and Racism in Historical Perspective, in: Natio­nal Politics and Sexuality in Transregional Perspective: The Homophobic Argument, ed. by C. v. Braun, S. Schüler-Springorum, A. Rohde (Ashgate, 2018), pp. 88-104; Rasse‘ und Raum. Topolo­gien zwischen Kolonial-, Geo- und Biopolitik. Geschichte, Kunst, Erinnerung, ed. by C. Bruns (Wiesbaden, 2016); Rassismus, in: Gender & Wissen. Ein Handbuch der Gender-Theorien, ed. by C. Braun / I. Stefan, 3rd edn (UTB, 2013); ‘Politics of Eros: The German “Männerbund” – Discourse between Antifeminism and Anti-Semitism at the Beginning of the 20th Century’, in: Masculinity, Senses, and Spirit in German, French and British Culture, ed. by K. Faull (Bucknell UP, 2011); Antisemitism and Colonial Racism. Transnational and Interdiscursive Intersectionality, in: Racisms Made in Ger­many, (Racism Analysis | Yearbook 2), 2011, pp. 99–12; Towards a Transnational History of Racism: Interrelationships between Colonial Racism and German Anti-Semitism? The Example of Wilhelm Marr, in: Racism in the Modern World: Historical Perspectives on Cultural Transfer and Adaptation, ed. by Manfred Berg u.a. (Berghahn Books, 2011), pp. 122–139.