What is Walter Benjamin?
{{Infobox philosopher | name = Walter Benjamin | region = Western Philosophy | era = [[20th-century philosophy]] | image = Walter Benjamin vers 1928.jpg | image_size = 225px | birth_date = {{birth date|1892|07|15|df=y}} | birth_place = [[Berlin]], [[German Empire]] | death_date = {{death date and age|1940|09|26|1892|07|15|df=y}} | death_place = [[Portbou]], [[Catalonia]], [[Spain]] | school_tradition = [[Western Marxism]] | main_interests = [[Literary theory]], [[aesthetics]], [[philosophy of technology]], [[epistemology]], [[philosophy of language]], [[philosophy of history]] | notable_ideas = Auratic perception, [[aestheticization of politics]] | influences = [[Theodor Adorno|Adorno]]{{·}}[[Johann Jakob Bachofen|Bachofen]]{{·}}[[Charles Baudelaire|Baudelaire]]{{·}}[[Bertolt Brecht|Brecht]]{{·}}[[Georg Lukács|Lukács]]{{·}}[[Karl Marx|Marx]]{{·}}[[Marcel Proust|Proust]]{{·}}[[Gershom Scholem|Scholem]] | influenced = [[Theodor W. Adorno|Adorno]]{{·}}[[Hannah Arendt|Arendt]]{{·}}[[Jacques Derrida|Derrida]]{{·}}[[Gershom Scholem|Scholem]]{{·}}[[Susan Sontag|Sontag]]{{·}}[[Michael Taussig|Taussig]]{{·}}[[Michael Löwy|Löwy]]{{·}}[[Susan Buck-Morss|Buck-Morss]]{{·}}[[Catherine Perret|Perret]] }} '''Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin''' ({{IPA-de|ˈvaltɐ ˈbɛnjamiːn|lang}};<ref>{{cite book| title=Duden Aussprachewörterbuch | edition=6 | year=2006 | publisher=Bibliographisches Institut & F.A. Brockhaus AG | location=Mannheim}}</ref> 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940)<ref name=Witte>{{cite book|last=Witte|first=Bernd|title=Walter Benjamin: An Intellectual Biography (English translation)|url=https://archive.org/details/walterbenjaminin0000witt|year=1991|publisher=Wayne State University Press|location=Detroit, MI|isbn=0-8143-2018-X|pages=[https://archive.org/details/walterbenjaminin0000witt/page/9 9]}}</ref> was a [[Germans|German]] [[philosopher]], cultural [[criticism|critic]], and [[translator]]. Benjamin was born to a [[Jew]]ish fami