Bildung

The idea of the Bildung is very interesting, especially Berman's exposition that the German Romantists considered the encounter with the foreign as the dialectic mediation which enables a higher fulfillment of oneself. In this mode, the foreign is embraced only because it facilitates progression towards one's higher self. This may ties into Duncan's question about the not-so-radical foreignness of the German Romantic project. Berman explains that for F. Schlegel, limitation is inherent in the experience of Bildung: "Limitation is what distinguishes the eperience of Bildung from the purely erratic and chaotic adventure where one loses oneself" (48). No matter how humble, self-critical one starts on the journey of Bildung, ultimately all the foreignness seems to matter only in relation to the ideal self. The vision of perfecting oneself thus seems to prescribe standards of the inclusion of certain foreign materal (e.g. the Greeks), and the mode of encounter which may be beneficial to the formation of the self.

In this context, Berman's casual invocation of the Umheimlich seems interesting (page 46, in parenthesis). For all we know, the Umheimlich is anything but a simple term designating the unfamiliar. It means the weird feeling of familiarity amongst the most estranged context. Ultimately, therefore, the experience with the forieng is a search for the self. But where does that leave the foreign? Does it retain its integrity when it is subsumed in the process of Bildung?

Lastly, it is interesting that Berman didn't discuss the meaning of "experience" in its original German meaning. Hegel also employs "experience" as the major mediating element in the development of the consciousness. In German, it is Erfalrung. Falrung, meaning travel or journey, defines experience as always a forey into the foreign.