Actualizing a Nomadic Historiography – On Affinities in Walter Benjamin’s and Rosi Braidotti’s Historiographical Thinking

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article compares affinities in Walter Benjamin and Rosi Braidotti’s historiographical methodologies, focusing on a monadic/nomadic perception of history. For Benjamin and Braidotti questions on how we remember, write and represent history are critical. Benjamin develops a non-linear representation of history in relation to the microscopic perception of Leibniz monad. Braidotti, in turn, develops a critical nomadic theory in relation to Deleuze’s re-reading of Leibniz’s monad. Can a link be established between these two adaptations of the concept of the monad? Can Benjamin’s historico-philosophical thinking be actualized in relation to the contemporary critical theory, such as post-humanism, queer and feminist theory?