Cultural History of Theft: A Foundation Myth

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Dorothee Kimmich
• Subject Area: General and Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies ; German Literary and Cultural Studies (Modern German Literature)
• Term: from 2013 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 237482448

The sly, cunning, brave, and clever thief is a prominent character: Narrations of theft centrally belong to both the Greek and Christian foundation myths that cultural history has varied up to the very present in many ways. Prometheus steals fire from the gods; Hermes hides the cattle that he stole from Apollo; Adam and Eve take the forbidden apple.Yet, theft can not only be located within the complex of these basic transgressions that concern cultural identity, it also shapes the narrations of self-positing, i.e. the constitution of the individual subject, as seen in Augustine's Confessions or in Rousseau. In modern literature, theft is also a popular means of selfdetermination: Poe's The Purloined Letter, the works of Musil, Zweig, Schnitzler, Genet, and Loher - all of them portray successful thieves.Theft has to be distinguished from robbery, abduction, trover, and extortion, since the latter imply the use of power: Theft is not based on power, it is based on cunning.Theft's specific feature lies in its ambiguity since it contains both participation and alienation: On one hand, the stolen goods bind the thief to his victim in participation, on the other hand, the thief alienates himself with the act of thievery. Consequently, the beginning is not an absolute one; it always refers to the previous event and, therefore, is not really an 'origin': In the scope of theft, self-positing and cultural identity always refer to both tradition and innovation at the same time. Hence, including autonomy and heteronomy, innovation and tradition, participation and alienation, protest and guilt, this ambivalence predestines the action of theft to be a more than productive philosophical and literary figure.Yet, topics like self-positing, autonomy, use of power, and the question of origins often highlight narrations of theft as texts that delve on the borderline between philosophical and literary reflexion. In order to examine the phenomenon of theft, literary texts have thus to be read as philosophical ones, and - vice versa - philosophical texts have to be read as literary ones. In other words: One has to choose a metaphorological approach that clarifies both collective and individual mythologems. The gains are twofold: On one hand, the reciprocal relationship between literature and philosophy can be examined, and on the other hand, their connecting factors can be made visible.Narrations of theft or the metaphorical usage of theft - that is the project's hypothesis - describe an action that constitutes a culture, a discourse, or the subjectivity and sovereignty of an individual.The project opens a genuine discussion on the research of national, cultural, and individual foundation myths. For the first time, it is concerned with a basically unexplored mythologem that has been highly productive from antiquity to the present.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Cooperation Partners: Professorin Dr. Irmgard Männlein; Professorin Dr. Schamma Schahadat
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Alexander Thumfart