XClose

UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies (SSEES)

Home
Menu

Just published: The Mind of the Nation: Völkerspsychologie in Germany by Egbert Klautke

1 January 2017

From: 1 November 2013

Völkerspsychologie played an important role in establishing the social sciences via the works of such scholars as Georg Simmel, Emile Durkheim, Ernest Renan, Franz Boas and Werner Sombart.  

In Germany the intellectual history of ‘folk psychology’ was represented by Moritz Lazarus, Heymann Steinthal, Wilhelm Wundt and Willy Hellpach.  This book follows the invention of the discipline in the nineteenth century, its rise around the turn of the century and its ultimate demise after the Second World War.  In addition, it shows that despite the repudiation of ‘folk psychology’ and its failed institutionalisation, the discipline remains relevant as a precursor of contemporary studies of ‘national identity’. 

Available from Berghahn Books. 2013. ISBN 978-1-78238-019-1.