Christian Jacobs studied history in Freiburg, Martinique, Taipei and Berlin. During his masters at Freie Universität Berlin, he focused on the global history of modern and contemporary Western Europe. For his MA thesis he conducted a research project on the rise of Maoism in France in the 1960s and 1970s funded by the German Historical Institute of Paris. His current research project explores the rising importance of culture in French politics from the 1960s to the 1980s. Previously, he published on Maoism in Europe and postcolonial memory culture in Germany.

Culture —Discovering a New Political Battleground in France and the World, 1962 -1984

The project analyzes the rising importance of culture as a concept in postcolonial France's political discourse until the 1980s. It explores contemporary conceptual debates on culture and how the concept changed during the period of investigation. The project analyzes the political usage of culture by political activists in three specific political movements: the women's movement, the postmigrant movement, and the so-called New Right. Since all the three movements were connected to people and ideas from all around the globe, the project does not look at France as a closed space but examines the importance of global developments and entanglements for the politicization of culture. Thus, the project sheds light on the influence of transnational networks and global circulation of ideas and helps to understand the interplay of conceptual debates and politics.

contact: christian.jacobs@fu-berlin.de