Assimilation as Abjection in Franz Kafka's "Ein Bericht für eine Akademie"

Abstract:

In detailing the cultural techniques required for his behavioral transition from ape to human following capture, Franz Kafka’s Rotpeter addresses not just physical but also cultural differences between apes and humans. The report can be interpreted as a satirical allegory of Jewish assimilation, a commentary that echoes Jay Geller’s notion of the “hierarchical differentiations that characterize antisemitism” (26). Although clothed, Rotpeter retains an ape’s body while exhibiting human behavior and thought patterns. The narrative implies that Rotpeter’s evolution entails cultural techniques of both domestication and hominization, rendering him neither wholly ape nor entirely human. This liminality leads Rotpeter to retroactively fetishize himself as a difference-embodying object while concurrently turning himself into a difference-encountering subject. The blurring of lines between the subject and object positions in Rotpeter’s subjectivity encapsulates the inherent ambiguity at the core of both abjection and Jewish assimilation.