The concept of Stimmung: From indifference to xenophobia in Germany’s refugee crisis
Top Cited Papers
- 1 December 2017
- journal article
- Published by University of Chicago Press in HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory
- Vol. 7 (3), 105-135
- https://doi.org/10.14318/hau7.3.006
Abstract
This article deals with the German concept of Stimmung, which does not allow a translation into the English notion of “affective mood,” but rather is simultaneously an internal and external state, subjective (involving the “I”) and objective (involving attunement [einstimmen] to others), enveloping both content and form. To understand the essential imbrication of individual and collective moods summoned by the term, we examine three empirical cases of Stimmungswechsel, or “mood shifts”—from indifference to ambivalence, to xenophilia and xenophobia—as they shaped the September 2016 German regional electoral campaigns. Following Sally Falk Moore, we focus on the “diagnostic events” which triggered these shifts, observed in fieldwork encounters with Germans concerning migrants and refugees who entered Germany in 2015. How did the perception and experience of “the refugee” become internal to the “mood shifts”? How is Stimmung linked to relations to refugees as psychic attachments that either echo an originary... Cet article évoque le concept allemand de stimmung, qui ne s’offre pas aisément à la traduction: il ne s’agit pas précisément d’une humeur affective, mais plutôt simultanément d’un état intérieur et extérieur, à la fois subjectif (un état du “je”) et objectif (impliquant une mise en accord - einstimmen - avec les autres,) comprenant à la fois le fond et la forme. Afin de comprendre les imbrications de l’individuel et du collectif invoquées par ce terme, nous examinons trois cas empiriques de stimmungszechsel, ou “changements d’humeur” - de l’indifférence à l’ambivalence, de la xénophilie à la xénophobie - qui ont influencé les élections régionales allemandes de Septembre 2016. En nous inspirant de Sally Falk Moore, nous nous intéressons surtout aux “évènements diagnostiques” qui ont lancés ces changements, observés lors de rencontres de terrain avec des allemands concernant les migrants et les réfugiés qui sont arrivés en Allemagne en 2015. Comment la perception et l’expérience du “réfugié” est-elle deven...Keywords
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