Andreas Reckwitz

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Andreas Reckwitz (born March 18, 1970 in Witten ) is a German sociologist and cultural scientist . He is Professor of General Sociology and Cultural Sociology at the Humboldt University in Berlin . Reckwitz was instrumental in driving the development of praxeology as a comprehensive social and cultural theory , a perspective that also underpins his influential work on the subjectification , creativity and singularization of the social.

Scientific career

From 1989 to 1995 Andreas Reckwitz studied sociology, political science and philosophy at the Universities of Bonn , Hamburg and Cambridge . He was a scholarship holder of the German National Academic Foundation . In 1994 he completed his master’s degree at Cambridge under the supervision of Anthony Giddens . In 1999 he was at the University of Hamburg with a thesis on the transformation of the cultural theories of Dr. phil. PhD. The dissertation supervisor was the sociologist Max Miller . From 2001 to 2005 he was a research assistant at the Institute for Sociology; In 2005, Reckwitz completed his habilitation at the same university with the text Das hybride Subject. A theory of subject cultures from bourgeois modernity to postmodernism.

In 2005 Reckwitz was appointed professor for general sociology and cultural sociology at the University of Konstanz , where he worked until 2010. From 2010 to 2020 he was professor of cultural sociology at the European University Viadrina . In 2010 and 2014 he received professorships at the universities of Mainz and Dresden. Since 2020 he has been Professor of General Sociology and Cultural Sociology at the Humboldt University in Berlin. Andreas Reckwitz had guest professorships and research stays at the universities of Berkeley, London (LSE), Berlin (Free University), Vienna, Bielefeld, Heidelberg, St. Gallen, Witten / Herdecke and Freiburg, among others. Reckwitz has been a member of the “Science and Current Affairs” advisory board at the Goethe-Institut since 2011 . In 2015 he was awarded the 'Opus magnum' grant from the Volkswagen Foundation.

Reckwitz publishes regularly as a guest author in the weekly newspaper Die Zeit .

Research priorities

The transformation of cultural theories

In his book, published in 2000 and based on Reckwitz's dissertation, he explains “cultural theories” as an independent form of explanation of sociological theory. It starts from a distinction between four cultural concepts (normative, holistic , differentiation theory, meaning-oriented) and ties in with the meaning-oriented concept of culture. He contrasts cultural theories with utilitarian and norm-oriented explanations of action: cultural theories explain action by referring to the order of knowledge. In detail, Reckwitz pursues a phenomenological-interpretative (Schütz, Goffman, Geertz, Taylor) and a structuralist strand (Levi-Strauss, Foucault, Bourdieu) of cultural theories in the social sciences. The first is subjectivist, the second objectivist. He defines 'practice theory' or praxeology as a synthesis between the two, which at the same time leaves behind mentalism (locating culture in the mind) and textualism (locating culture in discourses).

The hybrid subject

In the book published in 2006, which emerged from his habilitation thesis, Reckwitz pursues a historical cultural sociology of the forms of subjectivation that have shaped modernity since the 18th century. Reckwitz's aim is to identify overarching hegemonic “subject cultures” that can be found in the three fields of work, personal relationships and the technologies of the self. Three historically consecutive subject cultures are worked out: the bourgeois subject of the 18th and 19th centuries, the employee subject of industrial modernity and the postmodern subject (after 1980). All three turn out to be contradictory and unstable (bourgeois subject: morality and autonomous self-government: employee subject: social orientation and aesthetic orientation; postmodern subject: creativity and entrepreneurship). Reckwitz emphasizes the importance of cultural-aesthetic counter-movements for the change in subject cultures in the modern age and explains the movements of romanticism, the avant-garde and counter culture .

The invention of creativity

The book published in 2012 deals with the question of how creativity in the late modern era could become an influential social expectation. Reckwitz starts from the development of a creativity dispositif that is grouped around a certain “social regime of the new”, a regime of the aesthetically new. In addition, a constellation of producers and audiences who define the new is characteristic of the creativity disposition. Reckwitz works out the way in which the field of art is a model for the functioning of the creativity dispositive. The further development of the art field, the change in management discourse and the creative industries , the mass media star system, developments in psychology and the change in guidelines in urban development all contribute to the development of the creativity dispositif. The book ends with the elaboration of inherent tensions in the expectation culture of the creative.

The society of singularities

The book, published in 2017, examines the structural features of late modern society in the areas of economy, work, digital technologies, lifestyles / classes and politics. Reckwitz sees a “social logic of singularization” primarily at work in the late modern era, that is, an evaluation system that distinguishes particularity and uniqueness. He identifies economic (post-industrial, cultural capitalism), technological (digitization as a cultural machine) and socio-cultural (new middle class as the dominant milieu) causes. According to Reckwitz, the singularization leads to a social polarization, i.e. a devaluation of the non-singular. Conflicts over appreciation and devaluation are worked out as characteristic of late modernity at all levels (winner take all markets, attention competition, devaluation of the new lower class and old middle class, opposition through populism). The book ends with the diagnosis of a “general crisis”.

Honourings and prices

Andreas Reckwitz 'book The Society of Singularities . On the structural change of modernity , the Bavarian Book Prize was awarded in November 2017 and a jury of 30 critics voted it the top spot in the newly created joint monthly non-fiction book of the best of Deutschlandfunk Kultur , ZDF and Die Zeit . 2018 the book was even for the non-fiction prize of the Leipzig Book Fair nominated. His book “The Invention of Creativity” was awarded in 2014 and “The Society of Singularities” in 2018 with the “Humanities international” prize of the German Book Trade Association.

In 2018 Reckwitz was selected as a Thomas Mann Fellow for a fellowship at the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles. The fellowship awarded by the Federal Foreign Office and the Federal Ministry of Culture took place in 2019.

In 2019, Andreas Reckwitz was awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize , which is endowed with 2.5 million euros. In its justification for the award, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft characterized Reckwitz as "one of the leading and most original societal diagnosticians of the present ... (who) presented comprehensive and detailed analyzes of the structural change in modern western societies." In his laudation DFG President Peter Strohschneider stated: “Hardly anyone could have analyzed (the complex structural changes of modern western societies) more profoundly than the cultural sociologist and social theorist Andreas Reckwitz. ... For two decades, a series of influential studies that have an impact far beyond sociology and that have helped shape many research discourses in the cultural and historical sciences as well as those of aesthetics and art studies has been captivating and enriching experts and the general public. "

In December 2019, Reckwitz's book Das Ende der Illusionen was voted first on the best non-fiction book for non- fiction books of the month by WDR 5, ORF 1, Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Die Welt.

Fonts

  • Structure. For the social science analysis of rules and regularities. Westdeutscher Verlag, Opladen / Wiesbaden 1997, ISBN 3-531-13000-5 .
  • The transformation of cultural theories. To develop a theory program. Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2000, ISBN 3-934730-15-9 .
  • The hybrid subject. A theory of subject cultures from bourgeois modernity to postmodernism. Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2006, ISBN 3-938808-07-1 . (also habilitation thesis, submitted to the University of Hamburg in 2005; revised new edition Suhrkamp Berlin 2020, ISBN 978-3-518-29894-7 )
  • Subject. transcript, Bielefeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-89942-570-3 .
  • Blurred borders. Perspectives in cultural sociology. transcript, Bielefeld 2008, ISBN 978-3-89942-917-6 .
  • The invention of creativity. On the process of social aestheticization. Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-518-29595-3 (English translation: The Invention of Creativity. Modern Society and the Culture of the New. Polity, Cambridge 2017, ISBN 978-0-7456-9703-1 ; Polish Translation by Narodowe Centrum Kultury, Warsaw; Korean translation by Saemulgyul, Seoul; Danish translation by Reitzels, Copenhagen).
  • Creativity and Social Practice. Studies in social and societal theory. transcript, Bielefeld 2016, ISBN 978-3-8376-3345-0 (collected articles).
  • The society of singularities . On the structural change of modernity. Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2017, ISBN 978-3-518-58706-5 . (English translation by Polity, Cambridge; Chinese translation by Social Sciences Academic Press, Beijing; French translation by Maison des Sciences de l'Homme, Paris; Korean translation by Saemulgyul, Seoul; Turkish translation by Tün Kitap, Ankara; Danish translation by Reitzels , Copenhagen)
  • The end of the illusions. Politics, Economy and Culture in the Late Modern Age . Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2019. ISBN 978-3-518-12735-3 .

as editor

  • with Holger Sievert: interpretation, construction, culture. A paradigm shift in the social sciences. Westdeutscher Verlag, Opladen / Wiesbaden 1999, ISBN 3-531-13309-8 .
  • with Thorsten Bonacker: Cultures of Modernity. Sociological Perspectives of the Present. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt am Main / New York 2007, ISBN 978-3-593-38354-5 .
  • with Stephan Moebius : Post-structuralist social sciences. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2008, ISBN 978-3-518-29469-7 .
  • with Sophia Prinz and Hilmar Schäfer: Aesthetics and Society. Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-518-29718-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The transformation of the cultural theories. For the development of a theory program, with an epilogue to the 2006 study edition: Current tendencies of cultural theories. 2nd Edition. Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2008, p. 12.
  2. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The transformation of the cultural theories. For the development of a theory program, with an epilogue to the 2006 study edition: Current tendencies of cultural theories. 2nd Edition. Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2008, p. 11.
  3. ↑ Information homepage
  4. ↑ https://www.zeit.de/autoren/R/Andreas_Reckwitz/index , accessed on January 1, 2020.
  5. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The transformation of the cultural theories. For the development of a theory program, Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2000
  6. ^ Andreas Reckwitz: The hybrid subject. A theory of subject cultures from bourgeois modernity to postmodernism. Velbrück Wissenschaft, Weilerswist 2006
  7. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The Invention of Creativity. On the process of social aestheticization, Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2012
  8. ↑ Andreas Reckwitz: The society of singularities. On the structural change of modernity, Suhrkamp, ​​Berlin 2017
  9. ^ Franzobel receives Bavarian Book Prize . on: orf.at , November 7, 2017, accessed on November 7, 2017.
  10. ↑ Top list of non-fiction books: The 10 best non-fiction books in November. In: Deutschlandfunk Kultur. November 1, 2017, accessed November 2, 2017.
  11. ↑ preis-der-leipziger-buchmesse.de , accessed on February 21, 2018.
  12. ↑ boersenverein.de , boersenverein.de
  13. ↑ vatmh.org , accessed July 18, 2018.
  14. ^ Leibniz Prizes 2019 , DFG December 6, 2018, accessed December 6, 2018
  15. ↑ [1] , DFG , accessed March 24, 2019
  16. ↑ [2] buchmarkt.de, accessed on January 1, 2020
  17. ↑ http://www.suhrkamp.de/buecher/the_invention_of_creativity-andreas_reckwitz_29595.html?d_view=english
  18. ↑ http://www.suhrkamp.de/buecher/the_society_of_singularities-andreas_reckwitz_58706.html?d_view=english
personal data
SURNAME Reckwitz, Andreas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German sociologist and cultural scientist
DATE OF BIRTH March 18, 1970
PLACE OF BIRTH Witten