Doctoral research fellow  Henrike Scharff

The dissertation project examines the construction of imposters as paradigmatic examples of ambivalent enmity in interwar Germany (1918-1933). Imposters—individuals who fraudulently assume higher social identities for monetary or social gain—became abstract social figures that embodied both the anxieties and fascinations of the crisis-ridden Weimar Republic. They simultaneously represented threats to traditional gender and class orders while personifying the allure of social mobility and modern self-invention.

The project investigates how different social actors (media, judiciary, science) constructed imposters as ambivalent enemy figures through processes of "enemization," characterized by simultaneous attraction and rejection, fascination and fear. Through microhistorical analysis of individual imposter biographies and historical discourse analysis of media reports, court records, ego-documents, and scientific treatises, the study reconstructs the interactions between imposters and society, revealing underlying power structures and knowledge systems.

Theoretically situated within Enmity Studies, the research extends the framework to include intra-societal ambivalent enmity, demonstrating that such patterns operated not only in inter-ethnic or international relations but also within societies along gender and class lines. Imposters functioned as "frontline social actors" whose boundary-crossing activities brought different social cultures into contact, driving transcultural exchange processes within German society. The project contributes to Research Field 2, "Staging Enmity," by analyzing the highly performative nature of both imposters themselves and their representations in media, science, and law.