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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 July 2023
One of the oldest words in the German language Demut, humility, appeared to be back in fashion after a long spell where it had been neither seen nor heard. Even politicians tried it out, though it sounded distinctly more assured in the mouths of religious men and women. Investment bankers, known for professional ruthlessness, called the industry to ‘collective humility’ following the financial crisis. As others recognized as well, humility in this instance was calculatedly invoked and followed the adage: ‘Now that was embarrassing for me (getting caught).’ But German history has also examples of ‘genuine humility’, which was demonstrated, according to one internet commentator in 2012, by Chancellor Willy Brandt as he ‘fell to his knees in Warsaw’ in 1970. More common though are acts of humiliation. Under National Socialism, humiliation was a deliberate power strategy that state and party systematically used against people who were declared ‘inferior’ and denied the right to exist. Today, even unintentional slights or structural inequalities are often regarded as personal humiliation; sensitivity has clearly increased. This is related to society’s discourse of dignity and how, since the late 1960s, it has been reflected in educational institutions and the judicial system.
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