Modernity and decline of the experience in Walter Benjamin - doi: 10.4025/actascihumansoc.v32i2.7396

Abstract

As described by Walter Benjamin, the categories of erfahrung (authentic experience) and erlebnis (unauthentic experience) are fundamental to approaching the subject of modernization, they are a central point of analysis on the ways to perceive and feel the world, that are altered due to the profound transformation of society through urbanization, commercial development, the spread of technological growth and the propagation that written communication has on the culture sector. Walter Benjamin analyses in several works of art, the phenomenon of the decline of erhfarung (authentic experience) and ponders the progression of psycho social effects as a result of various writings (as Walter Benjamin explains ‘’The suppression of the language of Adam’’, allowing for the transmission of the essence of reality) from the Press, cultural development, and anonymous experiences in large city’s. As a result, this long process of introducing Modernity was essential an induced perception that is fragmented and discontinuous - the erlebnis (unauthentic experience).