Answering to the name: German-Jewish identity and individual identity in Franz Kafka, Gustav Landauer, and Franz Rosenzweig

The problem of individual identity and the problem of collective identity converge, in the modern German-Jewish milieu. In the post-Enlightenment climate of self-definition, not only collective categories such as "Jewish" and "German," but also the very notion of individual selfhood came under strain. For Franz Kafka, Gustav Landauer, and Franz Rosenzweig, writers and thinkers in distinct areas of intellectual life, who shared an intense interest in issues of self-identity, the question "was bin ich?" resonated with their problematic status as Jews within a German cultural context. In this dissertation, I analyze this convergence in light of the following question: how is it possible to construct a self that is at once Jewish and German?; This analysis is organized around two central metaphors: the conjunction "and," and the individual proper name. For the individual who would be Jewish and German, the relation between the two ceases to be one of synthesis, competition, or modification. "And" brings the two terms together and simultaneously keeps them separate. These individuals take up the challenge of defining a self on the basis of the "and." At the symbolic center of this effort is the proper name. Consisting of a first and last name, the proper name contains and focuses the tension implicit in the "and." The name singles out a one individual as unique and irreplaceable, yet it also marks that individual as a member of a group, a bearer of historical particularity. The tension between these two aspects of personal identity are entwined and complicated in the German-Jewish context.; This dissertation is an inter-disciplinary work of cultural history, grounded in the close reading of a variety of texts. While it identifies a historical constellation within the modern German-Jewish milieu that strove for an inclusive identity beyond Bildung, it also implies a set of fundamental issues and tensions in the broader problem of the relationship of the self to social, ethnic, and national collectivities.