Departmental Newsletter Spring 2008

Carol Poore published "Disability in Twentieth-Century German Culture" (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2007), a groundbreaking exploration of disability in German culture from the Weimar Republic to present-day reunified Germany. Richly illustrated, wide-ranging, and accessible, this book gives students, scholars, and all those interested in disability studies, German studies, visual culture, Nazi history, and bioethics an opportunity to explore controversial questions of individuality, normalcy, citizenship, and morality.

In 2007 Roberto Simanowski published the entries “Hypertextualität” and “Elektronische und digitale Medien” in “Handbuch Literaturwissenschaft” (ed. by Thomas Anz; Stuttgart, Weimar: Metzler 2007). He continued working on his monograph “Reading Digital Arts. In-Depth Analysis and Historic Contextualization” and started working on his monograph “Digitale Medien in der Erlebnisgesellschaft. Kultur – Kunst – Utopien” (to be published with Rowohlt in August 2008). In October,Roberto organized the US-German conference “Reading Digital Literature” at Brown (www.interfictions.org/readingdigitalliterature).In July,he attended the international conference “Remediating Literature” at the University of Utrecht with a paper on double coding of text in interactive environments. In December, he attended the international conference “Transmediality and Transculturality” at the University of Mainz with a paper on mapping-art and cannibalism. He is serving for the German Studies Department as Concentration Advisor, as Delta Phi Alpha Scholarship Advisor, and as coordinator of the student exchange program with Humboldt University in Berlin.

Jane Sokolosky attended the 2007 American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages Conference where she presented her paper entitled “iPods in the Classroom: Students as Producers”. In December 2007 the Goethe Institut Boston invited her to present this material to high school and college teachers of German as part of the Goethe Institut’s Trainer Netzwerk initiative.

Zachary Sng has just returned from a sabbatical leave, where he completed a book-length manuscript with the working title "Corrupting the Fountains of Knowledge: The Rhetoric of Error from Locke to Romanticism." In 2007, his article “Das Fehlläuten der Nachtglocke: Zu Kafkas Erzählung ‘Ein Landarzt’” appeared in the volume Kafkas Institutionen, ed. Arne Höcker and Oliver Simon (Bielefeld: Transcript, 2007). He also completed an article, “Figure-3: The Metaphor Between Virtue and Vice” which will soon appear in the volume, Configurations of the Third, ed. Ian Cooper and Bernhard Malkmus (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge Scholars Publishers, forthcoming).

Katrin served as the German Department’s liaison for the conference Fascism, Nazism, and Sexuality, a joint workshop of the Departments of Italian Studies and German Studies, held on 23 February 2008. Katrin has also been coordinating the GDR Film Series during the fall semester as well as the spring semester’s film series. Indulging in her passion for theater, Katrin was the dramaturg for the Brown University Theater production of Heiner Müller’s Hamletmaschine, directed by José Enrique Macián, which was performed to a capacity crowd from 21 February to 24 February 2008.

JOSE MACIAN ('08, Theatre Arts and Literary Arts)

José is a recipient of a Fulbright Award to study Theaterwissenschaft in Berlin. During the following year, he will be researching the effect of the East German theatre culture on contemporary Berlin performance. More specifically, he is studying the influence of Heiner Müller on the theatre work of directors Frank Castorf and Dimiter Gotscheff, particularly in their productions and rehearsals at the Volksbühne and Deutsches Theater.

JULIA BROOKS ('08, Public Policy & American Institutions)

Next fall, Julia will be going to Berlin as part of the international Humanity in Action Fellowship in human and minority rights. As a Fellow in Berlin, she will be working as an intern at the regional office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as well as participating in seminars on historical injustice and current human rights issues in Germany.

HANS KONRAD DIETRICH (’08, Biophysics)

Hans is currently working on a 5th Year Masters in the Artificial Organs, Biomaterials & Cellular Technology program at Brown. He has received a Fulbright award to do scientific research in Germany next year. He will be working at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Goettingen at the Genes and Behavior laboratory of Prof. Dr. Gregor Eichele. The project that Hans will be involved in is examining the role of ESCO2, a gene important in chromosome cohesion, and will utilize the most powerful microscopes in the world (imaging below 100 nanometers). Hans is also planning to do a side art project in watercolor to communicate my scientific ideas and results to a broader audience.