Abstract

PEREYRA, Guillermo. The concept of trace in the Philosophy of Walter Benjamin. Intersticios sociales [online]. 2018, n.16, pp.7-45. ISSN 2007-4964.

In the philosophy of Walter Benjamin, the concept of trace has several facets: the traces of history itself, of places and names, the traces that can be seen in different circumstances of the modern city, and, especially, the traces captured by urban collectives that find themselves in a state of shock. The question of trace also appears in the interest of German Baroque poets in the scriptural conception of history, in fragments of allegory, and in dismembered bodies, libraries, books and ancient ruins. The cities of Paris and Berlin are intimately-related to the issue of trace: Paris as the origin of Western modernity -according to Benjamin- and Berlin as the place of the philosopher’s own memories. The concepts of the “tradition of the oppressed” and involuntary memory revisit, each in its own way, the lost traces of the past.

Keywords : Walter Benjamin; modernity; remembrance; trace; body.