Ingrid Schreiber

Geburtsjahr: 1994

Studium:
DPhil in History, University of Oxford (2020-2024)
MSt in History, University of Oxford (2018-2019)
BA (Hons) in History and Gender Studies, University of Melbourne (2013-2017)

Wissenschaftliche Anstellungen bzw. Tätigkeiten:
Academic Assistant, St John’s College, Oxford (from 2022)

Solitude and Sociability in the German Enlightenment, 1756-1807

Solitude might constitute social isolation, loneliness, or even melancholy, yet a solitary orientation is essential to self-sufficiency, self-determination, and self-improvement. Such tension animated German philosophy during the Enlightenment, when the vitriol levelled at seclusion, misanthropy, and scholarly melancholy was matched only by the praise for autonomy, sapere aude, and das Selbstdenken. My research investigates this dynamic in the thought of three Königsberg-based intellectuals: philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), political economist Christian Jakob Kraus (1753–1807), and writer and statesman Theodor Gottlieb von Hippel (1741–96). It aims to uncover their views on solitude and sociability, grounding these in the cultural, political, and intellectual context of late eighteenth-century Prussia. What was the distinction between solitude and autonomy for these thinkers, and how can we account for the coexistence of contemporary discourses pathologising solitude and valorising independence, introspection, and personal autocracy? Where were the boundaries between intellectual autonomy and solipsism, virtuous freethinking, and Schwärmerei?