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Philipp Nielsen, Space and Spatiality in Modern German-Jewish History, German History, Volume 36, Issue 3, September 2018, Pages 464–466, https://doi.org/10.1093/gerhis/ghy024
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In the introduction to their edited volume, Simone Lässig and Miriam Rürup make the strong point that space as an analytical category would enhance modern German-Jewish history. The place of minorities in societies is marked by boundaries, by their position vis-à-vis the majority society both spatially and metaphorically. According to Lässig and Rürup, it was precisely in the transition from the more stable pre-modern to the modern world that the boundaries defining Jewish life became increasingly unstable. Investigating the production of Jewish space, the editors argue, provides a way to challenge the historiographical boundaries between Jewish and non-Jewish history. It would get the Jews out of the ghetto twice, so to speak. As some of the chapters of the volume, for example Anna Holian’s or Ruth Ellen Gruber’s achieve this double task, the editors’ subsequent statement that while ‘[a]cknowledging the trans-territorial and transnational dimensions of Jewish history, we wish especially to contribute to unveiling spatial and temporal structures particular to being Jewish or being defined as such’ (p. 5) seems like a retrenchment. It is, however, also a better description of what most of the chapters do. Considerably more consistent and consistently heeded is the editors’ call to focus on the construction of space and spatial identity through action and interaction—a trend that has, as the editors themselves indicate, gathered steam in German-Jewish studies, with some of the pioneers such as Michael Meng contributing to the volume. It thus seems a bit surprising if Lässig and Rürup initially declare that they do not want to subscribe to the spatial turn. Their introduction eventually seems to advocate just such a reorientation. While German-Jewish studies is turning, it might also bring affects and emotions into focus. Specifically with regards to space and practices surrounding them, the hopes and aspirations, but also anxieties, fears and disappointment, let alone anger and hate, would be fruitful considerations. Marion Kaplan’s forthcoming book on Jewish refugees in Portugal tries to do just that. And in the present volume, Nils Roemer and Anne-Christin Saß, for example, already do so implicitly.
