Friends Like These (A Comico-Political Essay)
Exile, a joke that stages exile, seems as good a point of entry as any into − and perhaps also away from − the Jewish question, the question of Jewish friends and the narcissism of whatever differences (our »echo chambers,« in today's parlance). Freud describes the joke, the Witz, as a story of...
Main Author: | |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
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Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
Published: |
Mohr Siebeck
[2020]
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In: |
Jewish studies quarterly
Year: 2020, Volume: 27, Issue: 2, Pages: 160-177 |
Further subjects: | B
beneficiary
B Freud B Exile B Mahmoud Darwish |
Online Access: |
Volltext (teilw. kostenfrei) |
Summary: | Exile, a joke that stages exile, seems as good a point of entry as any into − and perhaps also away from − the Jewish question, the question of Jewish friends and the narcissism of whatever differences (our »echo chambers,« in today's parlance). Freud describes the joke, the Witz, as a story of friendship and of enmity, with a twist. For the scheme of the joke is not dyadic (friend, enemy; us, them), nor is it quite dialectical. The joke rather calls for three people: in addition to the one who makes the joke, there must be a second who is taken as the object of the hostile or sexual aggression, and a third in whom the joke's aim of producing pleasure is fulfilled. Inspired by Robert Meister, in this paper I rephrase or translate Freud by invoking the lexicon of perpetrator, victim and beneficiary. |
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ISSN: | 1868-6788 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Jewish studies quarterly
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1628/jsq-2020-0012 |