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ABSTRACT
The notion of Bildung comes to prominence in the second half of the eighteenth century. It was originally conceived to capture the cultural conditions by which an individual becomes a moral agent. In Hegel’s thought, it develops a much more expansive role; it is at the heart of his socio-historical project. Bildung is Hegel’s theory of culture, but for Hegel, is not just the way in which individuals are cultivated, the process by which individuals internalise the norms of their society, or develop their autonomy. This paper argues that Bildung is key to understanding normative change and has a critical and underappreciated role in the development of world history. It is also at the heart of Hegel’s challenge to the dualism of nature and culture.
Notes
1 Many authors have recognised the importance of Bildung in the Philosophy of Right. See Neuhouser, Hegel’s Social Philosophy; Novakovic, Hegel on Second Nature in Ethical Life. For an excellent overview of the role of Bildung in Hegel’s thought as a whole, see Bykova, “Hegel’s Philosophy of Bildung.”
2 Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Volume I [1822–3]. Translated by R. F. Brown and P. C. Hodgson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 155. Hereafter cited in text as LPWH I. References to the critical German editions on which this translation is based are cited in text after the English translation. Vorlesungenmanuskripte II (1816–1831), ed. Walter Jaeschke Vol. 18 of Gesammelte Werke, (Hamburg: Meiner, 1995). Hereafter cited in text as GW followed by volume number. Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Weltgeschichte, Berlin 1822–23, ed. Karl Heinz Ilting, Karl Brehmer, and Hoo Nam Seelman (Vol. 12 Vorlesungen: Ausgewählte Nachschriften und Manuskripte, Hamburg: Meiner, 1996), 38. Hereafter cited in text as V followed by volume number.
3 Kant, “Ideas for a Universal History,” 18.
4 Hegel, Lectures on Natural Right, §136, my emphasis. Hegel did not have the great fortune to hear the songs of the pied butcherbird, a bird, by Australian standards of little colour, but with one of the most beautiful and musical calls of all birds.
5 LPWH I 162/V 12 50.
6 LPWH I 191/V 12 92.
7 LPWH I 196–7/V 12 99–100.
8 Hegel, Philosophy of Right, §331R.
9 There is a significant body of work on colonialism and racism in Hegel. See, for example, Guha, History at the Limit of World-History; Stone, “Hegel and Colonialism”; Tibebu, Hegel and the Third World; Monahan, Creolizing Hegel.
10 See Förster, “The Hidden Plan.”
11 LPWH I 383/V 12 331.
12 Lectures on the History of Philosophy 1825–6, Vol. II, Translated by R. F. Brown and J. M. Stewart Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006, 118. Hereafter cited in text as LHP II.
13 LHP II 117–18.
14 LPWH I 384/V 12 332–3.
15 LPWH I 384/V 12 333–4.
16 LPWH I 385/V 12 334.
17 LPWH I 386/V 12 335.
18 LPWH I 385/V 12 335.
19 LPWH I 387/V 12 337.
20 LHP II 172.
21 LHP II 136.
22 LHP II 136.
23 Hegel says that Greece and Rome being coastal civilisations was important for the development of autonomy.
24 Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Introduction. Translated by H. B. Nisbet (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1974), 202, my emphasis. Hereafter cited in text as ILPWH.
25 ILPWH 202.
26 LHP II 146.
27 Hegel, Philosophy of Right, §200A.
28 “Civilisation” is not used by Hobbes as it does not gain widespread usage until the middle of the eighteenth century.
29 Bildung comes into German to translate Shaftesbury’s notion of formation. Shaftesbury is influential in the development of this early sense of Bildung: See Horlacher, The Educated Subject, 41. Thanks to Camilla Flodin for pointing this out to me.
30 Markus, “Culture,” 320.
31 In this sense, I think the polarity of human collective self-cultivation and our natural condition is not as polarised as Pippin claims. See his interesting footnote on this issue in Pippin, Hegel’s Practical Philosophy, 126.
32 LPWH I 151/V 12 31. “Zucht, Erziehung und Bildung.”
33 Ibid.
34 The other formal structures of modern ethical life are also not examined in much detail; there is minimal discussion of the family and surprisingly almost no discussion of civil society.
35 LPWH I 180/V 12 76.
36 Hegel, Lectures on Natural Right, § 91. See also Hegel, Philosophy of Right, §187. The best analysis of Hegel’s view of culture to date is by one of the great theorists of culture, György Markús. He explains the subjective goal of Bildung this way: “someone is uneducated [ungebildet] who judges and understands everything from the viewpoint of his or her momentary concerns and limited insights. Being educated [as Bildung] means developing an ability to comprehend the thought and standpoint of others.” Markús, “Hegel’s Theory of Culture,” 404.
37 LPWH I 158/V 12 43.
38 LPWH I 178/V 12 73.
39 LPWH I 165/V 12 54.
40 See ILPWH, 95.
41
The imposition of form also includes the human development [Ausbildung] of one’s own body and spirit, the acquisition of capabilities and aptitudes [Geschlichkeiten]. It is only through Bildung that I make the universal within me, my potentialities and capacities, something determine and distinct from me; and it is by practice that I make the determinate mode of activity [I have learned] habitual.
42 Hegel, Lectures on Natural Right, §22.
43 Hegel, Lectures on Natural Right, §66.
44 LPWH I 155/V 12 37.
45 Ibid.
46 LPWH I 158/V 12 42.
47 See Lumsden, “Community.”
48 Novakovic, Hegel on Second Nature, 80, my emphasis. She has a very interesting and insightful discussion of these issues in the chapter devoted to culture in this work.
49 LPWH I 158–159/V 12 44.
50 ILPWH 84.
51 Arendt, Human Condition, 185.
52 ILPWH 208.
53 For discussion of how they are distinct, see Bubner’s comments on McDowell’s use of Bildung in Bubner, “Bildung and Second Nature.”
54 Barbara Merker provides a compelling account of embodied normativity in Hegel in Merker, “Embodied Normativity.”
55 LPWH I 159/V 12 45.
56 For a detailed examination of the role of second nature in Hegel’s philosophy of history, see Lumsden, “Second Nature.”
57 Thanks to the patient, careful, and thoughtful suggestions for improvement from two anonymous reviewers and to Cat Moir for her very helpful editorial interventions.
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Simon Lumsden
Simon Lumsden is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of New South Wales, Sydney. His research focuses primarily on German Idealism, Environmental Philosophy, and the Philosophy of History. He is the author of Self-Consciousness and the Critique of the Subject: Hegel, Heidegger and the Poststructuralists (Columbia University Press, 2014). He is currently completing a manuscript on Hegel’s Philosophy of History.