Publications
Contemporary Indian English Literature: Contexts – Authors – Genres – Model Analyses.
Eds.: Cecile Sandten, Indrani Karmakar, Oliver von Knebel Doeberitz. Tübingen: Narr, 2024.
Contemporary Indian English literature focuses on the recent history of Indian Literature in English since the publication of Salman Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children (1981), a watershed moment of Indian writing in English in the global literary landscape. The chapters in this volume consider a wide range of poets, novelists, short fiction writers and dramatists who have notably contributed to the proliferation of Indian Literature in English from the late 20th century to the present. The volume provides an introduction to current developments in Indian English literature and explains general ideas, as well as the specific features and styles of selected writers from this wide spectrum. It addresses students working in this field at university level, and includes thorough reading lists and study questions to encourage students to read, reflect on and right about Indian English literature critically.
Maternal Fictions: Writing the Mother in Indian Women’s Fictions. London: Routledge, 2022.
Indrani Karmakar
This book constitutes a feminist literary analysis of motherhood as represented in selected Indian women’s fictions across a diverse range of geographical, linguistic, class and caste contexts. Situated at the crossroads of motherhood studies and literary studies, this book offers a rigorous examination of the prosody and politics of motherhood in this corpus. In its five thematically focused chapters, the book scrutinises in depth such key concerns as maternal ambivalence; maternal agency and caste; mother–daughter relationships; motherhood and diaspora; and non-biological motherhood. It attempts to understand the literary ramifications of these issues in order to identify the ways in which fiction writers reconceive of the notion of motherhood and maternal identities from and against multiple perspectives. Another pressing concern is whether these Indian women writers’ visions furnish readers with any different understandings of motherhood as compared to dominant Western feminist discourses. Maternal Fictions advances feminist literary criticism in the specific area of Indian women’s writing and the overarching areas of motherhood and literature by acting as a launchpad into a complex constellation of ideas concerning motherhood. The fictional universe is at once ambivalent, diverse, contingent, grounded in a specific location, and yet well placed to converse with discourses emanating from other times and places.
Narrating Flight and Asylum
Eds.: Mandy Beck, Claudia Gualtieri, Roberto Pedretti, and Cecile Sandten.
Trier: Scientific Publisher WVT, 2022.
Series CHAT: Chemnitz English Studies/American Studies Today Vol. 11.
Over the past several decades, migration, displacement and asylum-seeking have become constitutive elements of contemporary conjuncture, generating conditions that are often described as "crises." Since the beginning of what has commonly been referred to as the refugee crisis of 2015, there have been discussions within political, social, media and online contexts about European nation-states closing their borders to asylum seekers and refugees. More often than not, these discussions are accompanied by racism, xenophobia or profound fears. To help mitigate these negative effects, the essays in this volume on NARRATING FLIGHT AND ASYLUM focus on the question of how flight and asylum-seeking are narrated in in-depth analyzes of literary and media texts, political and legal contexts, and museum work. more generally, they try to explore opportunities for political intervention and ethical commitment within a European, and specifically Italian-German-British, framework. With this volume, the intention is to focus on the issues of 'making voices heard' and 'making people on the margins seen' in a Europe where it is possible to observe what might be called "a war on immigration." The volume is inter- and cross-disciplinary, aimed at building a conversation that will expand inside and outside of academia, to include diverse, non-canonical cultural voices and methodological approaches and thus explore the topic of refugeeism and asylum-seeking across Europe and beyond. the intention is to focus on the issues of 'making voices heard' and 'making people on the margins seen' in a Europe where it is possible to observe what might be called "a war on immigration." The volume is inter- and cross-disciplinary, aimed at building a conversation that will expand inside and outside of academia, to include diverse, non-canonical cultural voices and methodological approaches and thus explore the topic of refugeeism and asylum-seeking across Europe and beyond. the intention is to focus on the issues of 'making voices heard' and 'making people on the margins seen' in a Europe where it is possible to observe what might be called "a war on immigration." The volume is inter- and cross-disciplinary, aimed at building a conversation that will expand inside and outside of academia, to include diverse.
Crossing the Channel – British-German Historical and Cultural Dialogues
Hrsg: Rudolf Boch, Marian Nebelin, Cecile Sandten.
Prinz-Albert-Forschungen / Prince Albert Research Publications (Band / Volume 2)
Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2022.
During the enlightenment period, Britain was advancing fast as a world economic and politicalpower, becoming an Empire. German writers, artists, and politicians became increasingly interested in the ideas, language, science, and the incipient industrial developments in the country across the Channel. This industrial boost gripped most European countries and led to a true Anglophilia in Germany. However, the British-German exchange was not a one-way road. Apart from aesthetic discourses in fields such as literature, philosophy, religion, or the arts, gardening was a great subject in the British-German cross-over. At the centre of this collection of essays, however, are topics that have received little attention to date. By concentrating on linguistics, physiognomy and phrenology, racial theories and twin studies, the reception of antiquity or biographical studies, this volume critically reflects on specific themes in the dynamic British-German cultural and historical dialogues.
Die Stadt: Eine gebaute Lebensform zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft
Hg: Jens Beutmann; Martin, Clauss; Cecile Sandten; Sabine Wolfram.
CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2022
Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier (WVT)
Die Stadt stellt einen Raum verdichteten menschlichen Zusammenlebens dar, in der eine starke Dynamik, ein besonderer (kultureller) Reichtum aber auch ein hohes Konfliktpotenzial entsteht. Diverse Paradigmenwechsel und -überlagerungen der Geisteswissenschaften haben für eine wechselseitige Betrachtungsweise der Stadt geführt, in der die Archäologie nicht ohne die textanalytische Betrachtung der historischen Quellen, und die Literatur-, Geschichts-, Politik- und Kulturwissenschaft nicht ohne die Betrachtung der 'Realität' von literarischen Diskursen auskommt.
Die aus sehr unterschiedlichen Fachkulturen resultierenden Beiträge des Bandes Die Stadt: Eine gebaute Lebensform zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft untersuchen aktuelle, historische sowie reale und imaginäre Städte als komplexe und aus verschiedenen zeitlichen, materiellen, metaphorischen und palimpsestuösen Schichtungen bestehende Phänomene. Dadurch bietet der Band eine interkulturelle und diachrone Auseinandersetzung von Stadt-Raum-Konstellationen, die zukunftsweisende Ansätze zur weiteren Diskussion bereithalten.
Protest: Forms, Dynamics, Functions
Hg: Mandy Beck, Cecile Sandten, Daniel Ziesche. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2021
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"Protest" is a very broad term. It is first and foremost an umbrella term for the repertoire of direct actions collectives can employ to publicly voice their dissent. In their long and many-faceted history, protests and protest movements have developed a considerable range of strategies, symbols, narratives, aesthetics, and operational modes, some of which have persisted, while others have changed and developed over time. Therefore, this collection of articles sets out to investigate the complexity and essence of the concept of "protest" within various frameworks by asking, for example, what a "protest" is, what forms it takes, where and when a protest is carried out, for which political, social, cultural, or economic reasons, and by whom. Ultimately, the collection seeks to explore how the potential of protest to productively intervene in different contexts, or to promote the unfolding of social schisms and thereby the furthering of societal debates, can be approached from numerous academic disciplines within the humanities.
Looking at protest's forms, keeping track of its dynamics and interrogating its functions, the variety of case studies which the volume presents intellectually challenges and substantially contributes to an academic field which has gained much scholarly attention in recent years. From the fringes to the centre, from the few to the many, from subculture to mainstream, from minorities to the majority, Protest: Forms, Dynamics, Functions offers a glimpse into this field in our very own 'Age of Protest' and will be of interest to researchers, students and the interested public alike.
Special Issue: Voices of Their Own: South Asian Women’s Writing
Hg: Cecile Sandten, Ranu Uniyal
Zeitschrift für Anglistik und Amerikanistik (ZAA) is an anonymously peer-reviewed journal that traditionally reflects the entire spectrum of English and American language, literature, and culture. Particular attention will also be paid to the new literatures in English, the development of linguistic varieties outside Britain and North America, the culture of ethnic minorities, and the relationship between anglophone and neighbouring cultural areas. The journal also welcomes contributions which examine theoretical and interdisciplinary issues in literary, linguistic, and socio-cultural research. Thus, ZAA invites contributions concerning a wide range of research on current issues, survey articles featuring recent developments in the fields of culture, literature and language, research reports as well as proposals concerning new directions within the discipline.
Special Issue: Representing and Narrating Flight, Refugeeism, and Asylum
Hg: Cecile Sandten
Postcolonial Text
Postcolonial Text is a refereed open access journal that publishes articles, book reviews, interviews, poetry and fiction on postcolonial, transnational, and indigenous themes.
Vision and Character: Physiognomics and the English Realist Novel.New York: Routledge, 2017.
Eike Kronshage
As readers, we develop an impression of characters and their settings in a novel based on the author’s description of their physical characteristics and surroundings. This process, known as physiognomy, can be seen throughout history including in the English Realist novels of the 19th and 20th centuries. Vision and Character: Physiognomics and the English Realist Novel offers a study into the physiognomics and aesthetics as presented by some of the best known authors in this genre, like Virginia Woolf, Joseph Conrad, Charles Dickens and Jane Austen. In this highly original approach to the issues of representation, visuality and aesthetics in the nineteenth-century realist novel, and even the question of literary interpretation, Eike Kronshage argues that physiognomics has enabled writers to access their characters’ inner lives without interfering in an authoritative way.
Crisis, Risks and New Regionalism in Europe Emergency Diasporas and Borderlands
Hg: Cecile Sandten, Claudia Gualtieri, Roberto Pedretti, Eike Kronshage.
CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2017
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This collection of essays explores the idea of the efficacy, limitations and future of Cultural Studies as a theoretical and methodological approach to the analysis of recent crisis phenomena in Europe. The volume spans a wide range of topics, including: theoretical and critical approaches to the stability of the EU as a political and economic union of its 28 member states; the (not only) recent flow of refugees into Europe and other countries, and the refugee tragedies off the coast of Lampedusa; the resurgence of far-right, anti-Islam political groups throughout Europe; the negotiation of affect and crisis phenomena in literary texts; and the question of media and refugees. These and other pressing issues are addressed and discussed from a variety of historical, political, pedagogical, gender, media and aesthetic perspectives, as encompassed in Cultural Studies and Postcolonial Literatures.
The aim of the volume is to arrive at a new working definition of Cultural Studies – making culture political again – in conjunction with Postcolonial and Gender Studies within a European context. Thus, the papers offer a fresh approach for a discussion of crisis phenomena in the context of complex encounters and conflicts, new regionalisms, emergency diasporas, gender studies, and neo-capitalism/neo-colonialism within a German-Italian framework and beyond.
Re-Inventing the Postcolonial (in the) Metropolis
Hg: Cecile Sandten and Annika Bauer
Cross/Cultures 188
ASNEL Papers 20
Brill | Rodopi, 2016.
Table of Content
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The notion of the postcolonial metropolis has gained prominence in the last two decades both within and beyond postcolonial studies. Disciplines such as sociology and urban studies, however, have tended to focus on the economic inequalities, class disparities, and other structural and formative aspects of the postcolonial metropolises that are specific to Western conceptions of the city at large. It is only recently that the depiction of postcolonial metropolises has been addressed in the writings of Suketu Mehta, Chris Abani, Amit Chaudhuri, Salman Rushdie, Aravind Adiga, Helon Habila, Sefi Atta, and Zakes Mda, among others. Most of these works probe the urban specifics and physical and cultural topographies of postcolonial cities while highlighting their agential capacity to defy, appropriate, and abrogate the superimposition of theories of Western modernity and urbanism.
These ASNEL Papers are all concerned with the idea of the postcolonial (in the) metropolis from various disciplinary viewpoints, as drawn from a great range of cityscapes (spread out over five continents). The essays explore, on the one hand, ideas of spatial subdivision and inequality, political repression, social discrimination, economic exploitation, and cultural alienation, and, on the other, the possibility of transforming, reinventing and reconfigurating the ‘postcolonial condition’ in and through literary texts and visual narratives.
In this context, the volume covers a broad spectrum of theoretical and thematic approaches to postcolonial and metropolitan topographies and their depictions in writings from Australia and New Zealand, South Africa, South Asia, and greater Asia, as well as the UK, addressing issues such as modernity and market economies but also caste, class, and social and linguistic aspects. At the same time, they reflect on the postcolonial metropolis and postcolonialism in the metropolis by concentrating on an urban imaginary which turns on notions of spatial subdivision and inequality, political repression, social discrimination, economic exploitation, and cultural alienation – as the continuing ‘postcolonial’ condition.
Britisch-deutscher Literaturtransfer 1756-1832
Hg: Lore Knapp und Eike Kronshage.
WeltLiteraturen/World Literatures 11
Berlin: De Gruyter, 2016.
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Im Zeitraum zwischen 1756 und 1832 lassen sich zwei Phasen des britisch-deutschen Literaturtransfers ausmachen. Die Anglophilie und europäische Gelehrsamkeit der Deutschen - besonders in Braunschweig, Göttingen, Hamburg, Leipzig, Zürich und Weimar - wird zum Ende des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts abgelöst vom wetteifernden Denken in den Kategorien Welt und Nation. Die Beiträge des Bandes nähern sich dem weit verzweigten Netz britisch-deutscher und am Rande auch deutsch-britischer Bezüge mit zwölf Fragestellungen, die sich auf die Rezeption, Übersetzung und Verarbeitung britischer Schriften im deutschsprachigen Raum bis nach Prag, auf den Vergleich ästhetischer Diskurse sowie auf Schilderungen von Englandreisen beziehen.
Home
Concepts, Constructions, Contexts
Hg: Cecile Sandten, Kathy-Ann Tan. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2015.
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Table of Contents
This collection of essays sets out to examine the complexity and significance of the idea of "home" in its various permutations and manifestations. It puts forward the notion of "home" not only as a physical spatial/geographical location, but as a cultural, socio-economic and ideological paradigm that is gendered and racialized. In exploring the different concepts, constructions and contexts of "home," and challenging the common associations of the term, the contributions in this volume propose that it might be less a static and fixed entity than a flexible, multivalent and even inherently contradictory term.
Adopting diachronic approaches to the concept of home from various disciplines such as literature, cultural studies, history, sociology, art, media, architecture, philosophy, and psychology, this volume includes an exceptionally broad variety of case studies and individual conceptualizations of home in literature, film, media, and the arts. It illustrates how the notion of "home" should be unhinged from prevalent and seemingly universal understandings of the term as a permanent location of repose and shelter, the place of one's origin and roots. Rather, the essays collected here propose that "home" refers to a much more complex, and contested, concept. To this end, they investigate the various productive tensions that emerge as a result of globally/locally contested spaces, diverging ideologies, conflicts of interest and power struggles, all of which re-shape and re-configure the various concepts, constructions and contexts of "home."
Shakespeare's Globe, Global Shakespeares
Cecile Sandten
CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2015.
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Table of Contents
In this valuable study, Cecile Sandten examines a selection of transnational Shakespearean adaptations in the genres of prose, poetry and drama that have emerged within and from a postcolonial context. Scrutinising Shakespeare's appeal as a cultural phenomenon and a mainstay of the British literary canon, Sandten insightfully surveys how rewrites from Africa, the Caribbean, India and Canada engage and transform Shakespeare's plays to tackle issues of race and ethnicity, class and caste, colonial history, gender and language in their respective culturally-specific contexts. As counter-narratives that seek to redress and re-configure historical and contemporary power structures and imbalances, these adaptations rework and re-inscribe the dominant narratives of western modernity, especially with respect to the binaries of colonised/coloniser, margin/centre, servant/master, them/us.
Broadly dividing these rewrites into four interlinked categories or strategic modes of Shakespearean adaptations – the "affirmation rewrite", the "writing back rewrite", the "individual rewrite" and the "mutilation rewrite", – this critical study focuses on the second and third approaches to convincingly illustrate how postcolonial writers have gradually transitioned from a "writing back" method of literary redress to a more transnational and syncretic form of literary adaptation. In this respect, Sandten perceptively elucidates how the process, and not merely product, of literary adaptation is less a one-way than a two-way exchange and of intercultural dialogue, syncretism and transformation.
Offering a critically nuanced take on the issue of Shakespeare as a "global" playwright, this study of transcultural adaptations of the bard's plays in postcolonial literatures will be indispensible to students and scholars of Elizabethan and postcolonial literatures alike.
Palimpsestraum Stadt
Hg: Eike Kronshage, Cecile Sandten, Winfried Thielmann. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2015.
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Als Raum erscheint die Stadt immer schon geschichtet. Die sich überlagernden Schichten sind als Palimpsest lesbar – sowohl im tatsächlichen Stadtraum, als auch in dessen ästhetischen Repräsentationen. Wo Schichtung als zentrales Merkmal von Stadtraum verstanden wird, entsteht ein Blick auf dessen Flexibilität und Wandel: Die Schichten werden freigelegt, die Überschreibungen und Verschiebungen werden lesbar und die Interpretation des Stadttextes gewinnt an Komplexität. Fragen nach Machtdiskursen, die Überschreibungsprozesse beeinflussen, lassen sich vor diesem Hintergrund neu stellen und beantworten, wodurch das Palimpsest des Stadtraums kritisches Potential gewinnt und seine Anschlussfähigkeit an unterschiedliche Untersuchungen beweist.
Der vorliegende Band spürt diesem Phänomen, dem Palimpsestraum Stadt, in 13 deutsch- und englischsprachigen Beiträgen nach, die sich historisch von der mittelalterlichen Stadt, über die Entwicklung der Metropole seit der Aufklärung bis zum heutigen Stadtraum erstrecken. Dem Thema vielfältiger Schichtungen entsprechend, stammen die Beiträge aus unterschiedlichen Fachdisziplinen: Der Mediävistik, der (antiken) Rhetorik, der Geschichtsforschung, den Literaturwissenschaften, der Kunstgeschichte, der Filmwissenschaft, der Linguistik, den Kulturwissenschaften sowie der Stadtplanung. Ziel des Bandes ist es, einen kritischen Stadt(raum)begriff vorzustellen, der dazu beiträgt, Aufmerksamkeit auf Schichtungsphänomene im Kontext komplexer Räume, Begegnungen, Konflikte, unsichtbarer Machtausübung und Übersetzungsvorgänge, zu lenken.
Journal of English and American Studies/ZAA
A Quarterly Journal of Language, Literature and Culture
Special Issue – Arun Joshi: Avant-Garde, Existentialism and the West
Guest Editors Pavan Malreddy and Dieter Riemenschneider, Berlin: De Gruyter, 62 (1), 2014.
Detective Fiction and Popular Visual Culture
Hg: Cecile Sandten, Gunter Süß, Melanie Graichen. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2013.
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Crime and detective fiction have never been more popular. When it comes to detective fiction and critical writings, as Larry Landrum remarked in 1999, "a great deal of effort has been put into the study of mystery and detective fiction and related genres, providing many new perspectives on how and when these forms emerged and how they are related to culture". As with all serial phenomena, the evolution of the genre of detective fiction can be described by two simultaneous processes: repetition and variation.
Thus, the purpose of this volume of essays is to bring together, in a bilingual format (English and German), both academic papers that were presented at the conference "Detective Fiction in American Popular Culture" held at Chemnitz University of Technology in October 2011 and three pieces of short fiction (one extract from a novel) that were awarded the "1. Chemnitzer Krimipreis". Moreover, several articles were commissioned specially for this volume in order to sharpen its focus on exploring the intersections between detective fiction (understood in a broader sense) and popular visual culture. Last but certainly not least, the publication of this volume marks not only the 60th birthday of Evelyne Keitel, Professor of American Studies, but also the 175th anniversary of Chemnitz University of Technology. The editors have, accordingly, decided to include articles by colleagues, friends, and young academics who share Evelyne Keitel's research and scholarly interests, in particular, her strong focus on detective fiction in American popular culture. This volume thus demonstrates how the intersections between detective fiction and popular visual culture have become a topic of interdisciplinary study in its own right.
Stadt der Moderne
Hg: Cecile Sandten, Christoph Fasbender, Annika Bauer. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2013
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Table of Contents
Review: Völker, Nico. „Schichten und Geschichten der Großstadt – Das ‚urbane Palimpsest‘ als Gestaltungsprinzip des Städtischen.“ KULT online 45 (2015).
Chemnitz embodies a city in which modernity is not symbolized by skyscrapers competing in height. Rather, it is the layered visibility of past and present that points to constant developments – architecturally, politically and culturally. Traces of old shop signs on houses in which a new company is now active make the progress in cities like Chemnitz obvious. Redevelopment, but also decay of buildings in urban space are the activities and effects with which the palimpsest 'city' is constantly being rewritten.
The volume City of Modernity is based on the lecture series of the same name, which brought together scientists for an interdisciplinary exchange on the forms and representation of modernity in the city on the occasion of the 175th anniversary of Chemnitz University of Technology and the simultaneous "Year of Science" of the city of Chemnitz. This chronologically arranged collection of lectures and essays as an interdisciplinary contribution to the urban discourse includes literary, visual, textual, historical and artistic representations of modern cities such as Chemnitz, Alexandria, Annaberg, Lisbon, Moscow, New York, Shanghai, Cairo or Delhi from antiquity to the present day Present.
Journal of Postcolonial Writing - Special Issue:
Orientalism and Terrorism: Theory, Text, and Images after 9/11
Guest Editors: Pavan Kumar Malreddy, Birte Heidemann. 2012
Journal of Postcolonial Writing - Special Issue:
Tracing the urban imaginary in the postcolonial metropolis and the "new" metropolis
Guest Editors: Ines Detmers, Birte Heidemann, Cecile Sandten. 2011
The renegotiation of gender in the context of family
Antje Tober
CHAT: Chemnitz English Studies/American Studies Today. 2011
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Die Ereignisse vom 11. September 2001 lösten in den USA ein nationales Trauma aus. Vor den Augen der Welt griffen Terroristen mit den von ihnen entführten Flugzeugen nicht nur bedeutende Gebäude in New York und Washington an, sondern auch das amerikanische Wertesystem und die Nation als solche. Neben der in kürzester Zeit lancierten außenpolitischen Machtdemonstration der USA mit militärischen Gegenschlägen in Afghanistan und dem Irak war eine Abschottung nach innen zu beobachten, die einem Rückzug in die kleinste gesellschaftliche Einheit, die Familie, gleichkam und mit einem konservativen Wertewandel einherging. Auch das Hollywoodkino reagierte auf die geänderte sozio-politische Situation in den USA, die mit dem Schlagwort "New Traditionalism" überschrieben werden kann. Als erzählendes Medium bot es eine Plattform für die narrative Verarbeitung des erlittenen Traumas. Die Familie war dabei ein amerikanischer Wert, auf den das Hollywoodkino - unter Rückgriff auf Mütter und Väter - wieder verstärkt Bezug nahm. Das vorliegende Buch, das die Veröffentlichung der Dissertationsschrift der Autorin im Fach Amerikanistik darstellt, befasst sich mit der filmischen Repräsentation von Müttern und Vätern, wie sie nach dem 11. September im Hollywoodkino zu beobachten war. In Vorbereitung der Filmanalysen wird zunächst der Problemhorizont skizziert, der Stellenwert von kritischer Theorie im Zuge von 9/11 bestimmt und der theoretische Zusammenhang von Nation und Familie hergestellt. Die beiden Analysekapitel bestehen aus dem close reading von jeweils vier spezifischen Mutter- und Vaterdiskursen, die eine Typologie bilden und sich in jeweils verschiedenen Genres wiederfinden. Pro Typ werden 3-5 Filme analysiert. So findet sich zum Beispiel der Typ der "Kämpfenden Mutter" in Filmen wie Panic Room (2002) und Flightplan (2005) wieder. Väter, die ihr Kind und dabei die ganze Welt retten, sind in War of the Worlds (2005) und I Am Legend (2007) vertreten. Ein Jahrzehnt nach dem 11. September 2001 bietet die hier vorliegende Studie einen kleinen Ausschnitt aus der unmittelbar im Anschluss eingesetzten Sinnstiftung der Katastrophe durch das Medium Film. Dabei wird deutlich, dass die Kategorien "Mutter" und "Vater" für patriotische Zwecke von kommerziell extrem erfolgreichen Filmen verstärkt mit der Idee eines biologischen Determinismus verknüpft werden. Differenziertere Betrachtungsweisen fanden sich dagegen nur in wenigen Nischenfilmen, die teils nur einen eingeschränkten Rezipientenkreis erreichten. Eine kritische Bewertung dieses neuen Traditionalismus durch den Hollywoodfilm findet daher fast nicht statt; am Ende der Filme ist die Ordnung stets wieder hergestellt.
Industrialization, Industrial Heritage, De-Industrialization: Literary and Visual Representations of Pittsburgh and Chemnitz
Hg: Evelyne Keitel, Cecile Sandten, Gunter Süß. CHAT: Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today. 2009.
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Pittsburgh, the American world capital of steel was, to all intents and purposes, "born out of fire": Iron and steel created this city. Chemnitz, the former "Manchester of Saxony," was dominated by the textile industry and engine construction. Both cities experienced a severe structural change and had to re-develop by the beginning of the 21st century. One of the central tasks confronting those seeking to invent 'narratives' for a new belonging in former industrialized centres such as Chemnitz and Pittsburgh is in the presence of the industrial heritage at all levels in the respective cityscapes. Paintings, movies, narrative texts and poems tend to foreclose alternative ways of thinking and seeing.
This collection of essays, largely the fruit of a symposium organized under the auspices of English Literatures and American Studies at Chemnitz University of Technology and the Industrial Museum of Saxony in Chemnitz, explores how industrialization and de-industrialization have taken such a firm hold on artists and writers in Pittsburgh and Chemnitz and provides a predominantly cultural perspective on those phenomena. The book is ordered chronologically. The essays collected examine various manifestations and literary as well as cultural representations of industrialization and de-industrialization primarily in Pittsburgh and Chemnitz. The contributors, for the most part young scholars in the areas of history, literature and sociology, offer a panoply of viewpoints of Pittsburgh's and Chemnitz' interaction with industrialization, industrial heritage and de-industrialization.