Context for the project “That Was It: Practices and Aesthetics of Stopping” comes from the societal and aesthetic problematics of closing, stopping, and ending that have been part of the manifold crises of recent years. Think of the “end” of the pandemic, of capitalism, of globalization, as well as the increasing exhaustion of natural resources. Apocalyptic and catastrophic scenarios, last generations, and forms of eradication and extinction determine current situations and permeate public debates – not least because questions of stopping are connected to aspects of survival.
This project approaches stopping in a praxeological manner rather than concentrating solely on thematic issues. We are interested in stopping as a practical problem. Social theories of systems and differentiation show that there are different temporal orders operating in modern societies that are difficult to synchronize: the end of one is the beginning of another. Additionally, all forms of social behaviour are embedded in routines and habits characterized by their inertia. Stopping is subject to supraindividual criteria, institutional frameworks, medial formats, and societal expectations. There is also a poetological dimension to stopping. Conventional endings are concretely linked to different manifestations of artistic forms. Furthermore, stopping shifts attention to questions and problems of editorial philology. Alongside these aesthetic issues of the ending, practices of stopping and closing come into view in different social fields and contexts – for example, in the phenomena of cancelling or ghosting, and the difficulties of departing from or ending a career, entrenched conflict, or life-extending medical treatment, in parting rituals and closing formulas, and in the processes and cultural techniques of coming to an end. Consideration of stopping ties in with a range of rhetorical and discursive practices that are not only demonstrative in character. Precisely in relation to academic argumentation, the question of stopping touches on the very textual constitution of thoughts.
In the framework of this project, a workshop will take place at KWI in March 2025. Presentations will address 1) Stopping in Organizations: Farewells and Departures, 2) Stopping and (New) Beginnings: Collective and Individual Transformations, 3) Deferred Endings: Suspension, Provisionality, and Postponement, and 4) Media/Cultural Techniques of Stopping: Media, Materialities, and Procedures.
Following the workshop, a collected volume will appear in 2026 with transcript Verlag. Additionally, from January to March 2025, the KWI Blog is featuring the series “Last Sentences”. Through thirteen case studies from the history of music, theatre, art, theory, and literature, as well as literary practice, the series explores what last sentences can accomplish and how we can read them. Last sentences go beyond the necessary function of closure for a text/play/film to suggest possible continuations, call what has been read into question, bring things to a (surprising) head, or leave the reader perplexed. As a result, they have a particularly strong influence on the affect cultures of reception.