2009

Ridvan Askin

* published
-- “Mneme, Anamnesis and Mimesis: The Function of Narrative in Paul Ricœur’s Theory of Memory”. FIAR: Forum for Inter-American Research 2.1 (2009): n. p. 
-- “Addonizio, Kim: das lyrische Werk”. Kindlers Neues Literatur Lexikon. 3rd ed. Vol. 1. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 88.
--  “Ai: das lyrische Werk”. Kindlers Neues Literatur Lexikon. 3rd ed. Vol. 1. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 144.
-- “Cruz, Victor Hernández: das lyrische Werk”. Kindlers Neues Literatur Lexikon. 3rd ed. Vol. 4. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 289-90.
--  “Wurlitzer, Rudolph: Nog”. Kindlers Neues Literatur Lexikon. 3rd ed. Vol. 17. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 596.

* gave a talk on “‘Nothing’s Authentic Anymore’: Bobbie Ann Mason’s Deleuzian Cartography in ‘Shiloh’. CONNECTdeleuze: The Second International Deleuze Studies Conference. University of Cologne, 10-12 August 2009.

* organized a workshop on the American West (with Johannes Fehrle, M.A., University of Freiburg). Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies, 11-12 November 2009.

* received external funding from the FRIAS-Competition “Junior Research Groups 2009” (with Johannes Fehrle, M.A., University of Freiburg). Runners-Up. FRIAS finances workshop on the American West, 2009.

Thomas Austenfeld

* was elected Dean of the Humanities Faculty for the two-year period from July 2009 to June 2011.

* published
--  (ed.) Critical Insights: Barbara Kingsolver. Pasadena, CA: Salem Press, 2010.
-- (ed. with Agnieszka Soltyisk Monnet.) Writing American Women. Tübingen: Gunter Narr, 2009.
-- "German Contributions to American Literary Scholarship."  American Literary Scholarship: An Annual 2007. Ed. Gary Scharnhorst. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2009. 474-489.
-- "Looking for Academic Family: Learning and Teaching in David Levin’s Exemplary Elders and Frank McCourt’s Teacher Man." Prose Studies 31.3 (2009): 181-189. 
-- "Locked Up Underground: Kay Boyle and Prisons." Writing American Women, eds. Thomas Austenfeld and Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet. Tübingen: Gunter Narr, 2009. 165-178.
-- "Kay Boyle". The Literary Encyclopedia. 24 March 2009. 
-- "La Peur dans la littérature américaine des années 1920 et 1930." La Peur et ses Miroirs. Ed. Michel Viegnes. Paris: Editions Imago, 2009. 325-345. 
-- "Why Does Daisy Die? Teaching Late 19th-Century American Literature in Switzerland." The American Literary Naturalism Newsletter 3.1-2 (2009): 7-11.

* gave the following presentations
-- "'Drowning is not so pitiful': Matchimanito Lake as historical, therapeutic, and demiurgic locale in Louise Erdrich's work." Presented at the Spanish Association for American Studies Conference, Barcelona, April 2, 2009. 
-- "Between Homage and Autobiography: Learning and Teaching in David Levin's Exemplary Elders (1990) and Frank McCourt's Teacher Man (2005)." Presented at the conference on Academic Autobiography, Universidad de Navarra, Pamplona, March 28, 2009. 
-- "Rosicky's Neighbors: Values, Virtues, and the Contingency of Criticism." Invited Guest Lecture, presented to the English Department of the University of Bern, Switzerland, March 9, 2009. 
-- "Genre,Voice, Identity: Nonfiction Prose and the Personal Essay." Presented to the Swiss Society of General and Comparative Literature, University of Fribourg, March 7, 2009.

* sponsored a visit by Prof. Sandra Spanier, Pennsylvania State University, to Fribourg on September 15, 2009:  "Reading Hemingway's Mail: The Hemingway Letters Project."

* invited the following speakers:
Prof. Dr. Paul Tayyar (Golden West College) gave a lecture on “The Ceremonial Poets” on March 16, 2009 and a poetry reading on March 17, 2009.
Fulbright lecturer Prof. Dr. Michael Rozendal (University of San Francisco) gave a lecture on “Imagination Joined to Common Purpose: Transforming American Myths in John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath” on Feb. 17, 2009. 

* invited a Visiting Professor: Prof. Dr. Susan White (University of Arizona) taught a block seminar on “Literature and Film: Hitchcock and Kubrick” in the fall semester of 2009.

Mariacristina Natalia Bertoli

* published
“Anamorfosi e Trompe-l’œil. Un’introduzione alla poesia di Mary Jo Salter.” Semicerchio 40.1 (Forthcoming).
“Copernican Revolutions: Mary Jo Salter’s Intertextual Interpretation of Paradise Lost in Falling Bodies.” Miscelánea 40 (Fothcoming). 
 “A Muse of One’s Own: Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women and the ‘Androgynous Mind’.” SPELL 23 (Writing American Women). Ed. T. Austenfeld and A. Soltysik Monnet. Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag, 2009: 63-81.
“Paola Loreto: l’eloquenza dell’inespresso”. Bloc Notes 57 (2009): 193-208.
gave talks on
“Who’s Afraid of the Dark in the Attic? Memory, Identity and Trauma in Gothic Fiction,” seminar paper given at the conference “(Mis-)Representations: Trauma Discourses and Cultural Productions” (University of Zürich, Switzerland, 17 Oct. 2009).
“The Borderland of Prosody: Theory and Practice of Horizontverschmelzung in Poetic Translation,” seminar paper given at the AISNA Conference “Translating America” (University of Torino, Italy, 24 Sept. 2009).
gave a guest lecture on
 “Ontologia e fenomenologia della critica letteraria psicoanalitica” (“Ontology and Phenomenology of Psychoanalytic Criticism”), guest Lecture given at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore (Brescia, Italy) by invitation of Prof. Marco Corradini (History of Literary Criticism) on  7 Dec. 2009.
participated in
the theory module organized by the CUSO “Genealogies of Modern Literary Theories” (Sils-Maria, Switzerland, 31 Aug. - 3 Sept. 2009)   

Ursula Caci

* has been working on her Ph.D. project on Gertrude Stein since February 2008

* received a Marie Heim-Vögtlin scholarship of the Swiss National Science Foundation for the duration of two years

* became a member of 
-- the graduate program „Repräsentation, Materialität und Geschlecht. Gegenwärtige und historische Neuformierungen der Geschlechterverhältnisse“ at the Centre for Gender Studies in Basel in February 2009
-- the peer mentoring group „Geistreich“ founded by the University of Zurich’s Centre for Gender Equality in March 2009

* presented her Ph.D. project at the following conferences:
-- CUSO doctoral conference on “Literature and the Environment” in Geneva in October 2009. Paper title: “Locating Gender in Space: Emily Dickinson’s Conception of Gender. Landscapes as Sexual Metaphors”
-- “2nd annual EUCOR English Trinational Colloquium For PHD-Students” in Freiburg in December 2009. Paper title: “Locating Gender in Space: Emily Dickinson’s Conception of Gender. Nature and Female Identity”

Dana Frei

* has completed and submitted her doctoral dissertation "Challenging Heterosexism from the Other Point of View: Representations of Homosexuality in Queer as Folk and The L Word"

* received funding for a Peer Mentoring Group which has organized various group events and a public panel on the perspectives of Popular Cultures Studies at University of Zurich with international guest speakers on 27th October 2009
served as assistants’ delegate at faculty meetings (Mittelbauvertretung Philosophische Fakultät UZH)

Nicole Frey Büchel 

* gave a paper entitled "'Indefinite, sketchy, but not entirely obliterated:' Perspectives of Selfhood and Textual Meaning in Middlesex" at the conference "Rethinking Narrative Identity: A Question of Perspective" (Humboldt Universität Berlin, 26-28 November 2009).

* published a review of Lindner, ed. Teaching India. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2008. In: ph akzente 16.4 (2009): 34.

Jürgen Grandt

* published 
-- a book entitled Shaping Words to Fit the Soul: The Southern Ritual Grounds of Afro-Modernism. Columbus: The Ohio State University Press, 2009.
-- an essay on “‘And yet I can’t imagine that you want me too’: The Spectacle of Whiteness and the Black Jazz of Art Pepper.” Forum for Inter-American Research 2.2 (2009). .

* gave talks on
-- “‘A song don’t just spring outer nowhere’: Recording Technology and the Invention of Authenticity in Lee Smith’s The Devil’s Dream. 2009 Convention of the Modern Language Association of America (MLA). Philadelphia, PA. 30 Dec. 2009.
--  “Freedom in the Groove: Overdubbing History in August Wilson’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.” Sixty-ninth Annual Convention of the College Language Association (CLA), University of Maryland-Eastern Shore, MD, 30 March 2009.

Hartwig Isernhagen 

* published two pieces in the catalog for an exhibition that he curated and that ran through much of 2009: 
-- an introduction to the exhibition (“Bodmer – Wied – Amerika: Eine Entdeckungsreise”/”Bodmer – Wied – America: A Journey of Exploration”. Karl Bodmer: A Swiss Artist in America / 1809-1893 / Ein Schweizer Künstler in Amerika. Ed. Nordamerika Native Museum. Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess, 2009. 18-41)
-- an intellectual-historical analysis (“Bodmer, durch Humboldt gelesen”  / “Reading Bodmer Through Humboldt”.  Karl Bodmer: A Swiss Artist in America / 1809-1893 / Ein Schweizer Kuenstler in Amerika. Ed. Nordamerika Native Museum. Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess, 2009. 94-121). 

* published 
-- “Indigeneity in Literature and Criticism: Power, conflict, transnational solidarity, de-/re-nationalization, globalization.” Native Americans and First Nations: A Transnational Challenge. Beiträge zur englischen und amerikanischen Literatur, 29. Ed. Waldemar Zacharasiewicz & Christian F. Feest. Paderborn: F. Schöningh, 2009. 239-251.
-- “Ethnologische Präzision und ästhetische Wirkung: Karl Bodmer im ‘inneren Nord-America’” A4: Magazin für Aussereuropäische Kunst und Kultur 01/2009. 60-65.  

Nidesh Lawtoo

* won the Bruce Harkness Young Scholars Award

* gave talks on
-- “Mimesis in the post-Darwinian World: Conrad’s Evolutionary Anthropology.” MLA, Philadelphia, December 2009.
-- “Bataille and the Laughter of the Socius” ACLA, Harvard University, March, 2009. 
-- “Bataille’s Ticklish Communication” (co-presented with Mikkel Borch-Jacobsen), University of Washington, February, 2009. 

Sämi Ludwig

* published 
-- "From Phallic Binary to Cognitive Wager: Empathy and Interiority in Lois-Ann Yamanaka's Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers." Writing American Women: Text, Gender, Performance. Eds. Thomas Austenfeld and Agnieszka Soltysik. SPELL (Swiss Publications on English Literature and Language), 2009. 

* gave papers on
-- the "Geometrics of Redemption" in Faulkner at BAAS in Nottingham in April
-- Puritan literacy at a conference on the "Written Word" in Strasbourg
-- the function of the image at a conference on "L'interculturel dans tous ses états" in Mulhouse

* chaired a panel on "cultural citizenship in Asian American literature" at the ASA in Washington D.C. in November 

* has again been the local liaison person for the trinational MA conference of the upper Rhine universities (this December in Freiburg/Br.) and organized an additional conference session for our MA students in Mulhouse.

Christina Ljungberg

* published
-- Redefining Literary Semiotics. Newcastle on Tyne: Cambridge Scholars’ Press, 2009. Co-editor with J. D. Johansen and H. Veivo.
-- (with H. Veivo). Introduction. Redefining Literary Semiotics. Ed. J. Dines Johansen, Christina Ljungberg and Harri Veivo. Nescastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars' Press, 2009. 1-9. 
-- “Subjectivity as Performance in Literary Texts.” Redefining Literary Semiotics. Ed. J. Dines Johansen, Christina Ljungberg and Harri Veivo. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars' Press, 2009. 86-109. 
-- “Cartographies of the Future: Julie Mehretu’s Dynamic Charting of Fluid Spaces.” The Cartographic Journal: Art & Cartography [Special Issue] 46. 4  (November 2009): 308–315.

* co-organized The Seventh International Symposium on “Iconicity in Language and Literature” held together with a parallel running workshop on Cognitive Poetics at Victoria College, University of Toronto, 9-14 June 2009, together with Paul Bouissac, Pascal Michelucci, and Olga Fischer. 

* was invited to head a colloquium at Heath, MA, 14-16 June 2009, on the intersection of Cognitive Poetics and Iconicity studies at the MICA, the Myrifield Institute for Cognition and the Arts, by Prof. Margaret Freeman.

* gave the following papers:
-- Luzern, 15 April, 2009. “Canada and intercultural communication.” Invited guest lecture at the Hochscule Luzern.
-- Groningen, 25 May, 2009. “The Text Unbound: Intersemiotic translations in Peter Greenaway’s Prospero’s Books.” Closed symposium titled “Intermediality: Terms, Concepts and Approaches” 25-26 May, 2009, invited by Dr. Els Jongeneel (Dept. of Art and Media, University of Groningen) and Dr. Valerie Robillard (Dept. of English, University of Groningen).
-- Toronto, 12 June 2009. "Unbinding the Text: Intermedial iconicity in Peter Greenaway's Prospero's Books.” The Cognitive Poetics workshop at the 7th International Symposium on Iconicity in Language and Literature 9-14 June at Victoria College at the University of Toronto.
Heath, MA, 16 July 2009. “Mapping the Body: Experiencing literature through physical space.” Public lecture given together with Prof. Vincent Colapietro at the Heath Community Center, MA, invited by the MICA, the Myrifield Institute for Cognition and the Arts.
-- Köln, 26 June 2009. "Dots and Speckles in Julie Mehretu’s Archaeologies of the Future." Talk given at the workshop on "Punkte und Flecken," 26-27 June 2009 at the Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln, invited by Prof. Peter Bexte and Dr. Gabriele Gramelsberger.
-- La Coruña, 24 September 2009. “Cartographies of the Future: Julie Mehretu’s dynamic mapping of fluid spaces.” Talk given at the 10th World Congress of Semiotics at La Coruña 22-26 September 2009.
-- La Coruña, 25 September 2009. “Redefining literary semiotics.” Presentation and Roundtable on the publication of the book Redefining Literary Semiotics at the 10th World Congress of Semiotics at La Coruña 22-26 September 2009.

Deborah Madsen

* published a monograph on Understanding Gerald Vizenor (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2009).

* co-edited (with Andrea Riemenschnitter) Diasporic Histories: Cultural Archives of Chinese Transnationalism (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2009)

* published the following essays
-- "The Rhetoric of the Double Negative: Canadian Diasporic Chinese Literatures," trans. Xu Yingguo and Ding Hui, Nankai xuebao, 5 (2009), pp. 29-34.
-- "'The Exception that Proves the Rule'? National Fear, Racial Loathing, Chinese Writing in 'UnAustralia'," Antipodes: A North American Journal of Australian Literature, (June 2009), pp. 17-22.
-- “Discourses of Frontier Violence and the Trauma of National Emergence: Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove Quartet,” Canadian Review of American Studies, special issue: "Popular Westerns: New Scholarship," 39. 2 (2009), pp. 185-20.
-- "Trickster Narratives of the New World? Erdrich, Dorris, Columbus," in Louise Erdrich: New Essays in Criticism, ed. Brajesh Sahawney (Lampeter: Edwin Mellen, 2009), pp. 75-93.
-- "Travels  in the Body: Technologies of Waste in Chinese Diaspora," in China  Abroad: Travel, Spaces, Subjects, ed. Elaine Yee Lin Ho & Julia Kuehn  (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2009), pp. 173-90.
"Writing Chinese Diaspora After the 'White Australia' Policy," in Reading Down Under: Australian Literary Studies Reader, ed. Amit Sarwal and Reema Sarwal (New Delhi: SSS Press, 2009), pp. 263-70.

* gave talks at
-- Universities of Lausanne & Geneva, "Crossing the Americas" conference, "Hemispheric Indigeneity."
-- Department of English, University  of Leicester, "Gerald Vizenor: Writing in the Fourth Person."
-- School of English, University  of Hong Kong, "Queering Chinese Diaspora: Transnational Beauty  Pageants and Gender Performance."
-- Clare Hall, Cambridge University, "The UnAmerican: Rhetorical Genealogies."
-- Institute for Native American Studies, University of Georgia, "Native Studies in Europe: Where Are We? Where Are We Going?"
-- Native American and Indigenous Studies Association conference, University of Minnesota, "Pronouns and Place in Gerald Vizenor's Non-Fiction Prose."
-- ASA Annual Convention, Washington DC, "The States We're In (and Out): Metaphors of Transnation."

* taught an intensive week-long Graduate Seminar on "American Exceptionalism" at the University of Salamanca

* organized the Second Annual Native Studies Masterclass at the University of Geneva, Switzerland. Sponsored by the Department of English, University of Geneva, March 13, 2009.

Michael Prusse

* published the following essays:
-- “Towards a Cosmopolitan Readership: New Literatures in English in the Classroom.” Frank Schulze-Engler and Sissy Helff, eds. Transcultural English Studies: Theories, Fictions, Realities. (Cross/Cultures series 102) Amsterdam and New York: Rodopi, 2009, 373-391.
-- “Teaching to Read and Reading to Teach: English Literature in Teacher Education.” Lars Eckstein and Christoph Reinfandt, eds. Anglistentag 2008 Tübingen: Proceedings. Trier: Wissenschaftlicher Verlag, 2009, 335-345. 
-- “Symmetry Matters: John McGahern’s ‘Korea’ as Hypertext of Ernest Hemingway’s ‘Indian Camp’.” Georges Letissier, ed. Rewriting/Reprising: Plural Intertextualities. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2009, 22-38. 
-- (with Sandra Hutterli) “Blending Theory and Practice: In-Service Teacher Education by Means of Innovative Projects.” VIEWS. 18, 3 (2009): 68-71
-- “Imaginary Pasts: Colonisation, Migration and Loss in J.G. Farrell’s The Singapore Grip and in Amitav Ghosh’s The Glass Palace.” Transnational Literature. 2, 1 (November 2009). [http://fhrc.flinders.edu.au/transnational/home.html]

* gave a paper (together with Sandra Hutterli) on “Blending Theory and Practice: In-Service Teacher Education by Means of Innovative Projects.” Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice Conference, Fachdidaktisches Zentrum Englisch der Universität Wien, Österreich, 26. 2. 2009.

Gabriele Rippl

* co-edited 
-- the forthcoming essay collection Gabriele Rippl, Philipp Schweighauser, Tiina Kirss, Therese Steffen and Margit Sutrop, eds. Haunted Narratives: The Politics and Poetics of Identity Formation and 20-Century Life Writing. 2009.
-- the essay collection Emden, Christian and Gabriele Rippl, eds. Imagescapes: Studies in Intermediality. Oxford etc.: Peter Lang, 2009. 

* published the following essays:
-- Rippl, Gabriele, Lukas Etter, Stephanie Hoppeler. “Intermedialität in Comics: Neil Gaimans Sandman”. Comics: Zur Geschichte und Theorie eines populärkulturellen Mediums. Eds. Stephan Ditschke, Katerina Kroucheva and Daniel Stein. Bielefeld: transcript, 2009, 53-79.
-- Rippl, Gabriele. “Ancient Myths and Cultural Change: Phaedra’s Illicit Love in Twentieth-Century Anglo-American Drama”. Drama and Cultural Change: Turning around Shakespeare. Ed. Matthias Bauer and Angela Zirker. Trier: wvt, 2009, 179-197.
-- Rippl, Gabriele, Philipp Schweighauser and Therese Steffen. “Introduction”. Haunted Narratives: The Politics and Poetics of Identity Formation and 20-Century Life Writing. Eds. Tiina Kirss, Gabriele Rippl, Philipp Schweighauser, Therese Steffen and Margit Sutrop. 2010. (Forthcoming) 
-- Rippl, Gabriele. “Inszenierung von Differenz: Interreligiöse Konflikte im englischsprachigen indischen Gegenwartsroman”. Aufgeklärte Zeiten? Religiöse Toleranz und Literatur. Eds. Nina Gülcher, Romana Weiershausen and Insa Wilke. 2009. 
-- Rippl, Gabriele. “Stumme Augenzeugen – Funktionen erzählter Fotos in englischsprachigen postkolonialen trauma novels”. Visuelle Evidenz? Fotografie im Reflex von Literatur und Film. Eds. Sabina Becker and Barbara Korte. Berlin etc.: Walter de Gruyter, 2009. 
-- Rippl, Gabriele. “English Literature and Its Other: Towards a Poetics of Intermediality”. Imagescapes: Studies in Intermediality. Eds. Christian Emden and Gabriele Rippl. Oxford etc.: Peter Lang, 2009. 
-- Rippl, Gabriele. “Naked in the grip of reality – A. L. Kennedy's Ästhetik der Gewalt”. Gewalt und Geschlecht in der Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts. Ed. Susanne Bach. Paderborn: Schöningh, 2009. 

* published the following dictionary entries:
-- “Margaret Cavendish – Autobiographie”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 3. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 607.
-- “Margaret Cavendish – Biogramm”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 3. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 606.
-- “Pauline Melville – Shape-Shifter”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 11. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 166.
-- “Pauline Melville – Biogramm”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 11. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 166.
-- “Simic – Das Lyrische Werk”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 15. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 162.
-- “Simic – Biogramm”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 15. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 161.
-- “Plath – Das Lyrische Werk”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 13. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 62.
-- “Plath – Biogramm”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 13. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 61.
-- “Gilman, Herland”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 6. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 247-249.
-- “Gilman – Biogramm”. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon. Ed. Heinz Ludwig Arnold. 3. revised edition. Vol. 6. Stuttgart-Weimar: Metzler, 2009. 247-249.

* published reviews of
-- Lambert Wiesing. Die Sichtbarkeit des Bildes. Geschichte und Perspektiven der formalen Ästhetik. Frankfurt etc.: Campus, 2008. In: JLTonline , 2009.
-- (with Julia Straub). Kimberly Rhodes. Ophelia and Visual Culture: Representing Body Politics in the Nineteenth Century. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2009, and Graham Smith. “Light that Dances in the Mind”: Photographs and Memory in the Writings of E. M. Forster and His Contemporaries. Oxford: Peter Lang, 2007. In: ZAA, 2009.
-- Monika Schmitz-Emans and Gertrud Lehnert. Eds. Visual Culture. Heidelberg: Synchron, 2008. 2009.
-- Ronald Bedford, Lloyd Davis and Philippa Kelly. Eds. Early Modern English Lives: Autobiography and Self-Representation 1500-1660. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007, and Meredith Anne Skura, Tudor Autobiography: Listening for Inwardness. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008. In: Shakespeare Jahrbuch, 2009.

* gave the following lectures:
-- Juni 2009: “Iconic Features in Charles Simic’s Dime-Store Alchemy”, International  Symposium on Iconicity in Language and Literature, University of Toronto
-- Juni 2009 “Images of Masculinity in Texts of Early Modern Women: Cavendish, Fanshawe and Bradstreet”, University of Dresden
-- Juni 2009: “The Melancholic Discourse in England and Its Transatlantic Colonies: Examples of Seventeenth-Century Appropriations”, University of Augsburg
-- Mai 2009: “Was kann Literatur? Gewaltdarstellungen und ihre Funktion in der englischsprachigen Gegenwartsliteratur”, Bern    
-- März 2009: “Response” zu Winfried Fluck „The Second Narrative: Funktionsgeschichte and Aesthetic Experience”, DFG-Methodentagung, Bad Bederkesa
-- März 2009: “John Updikes Seek My Face (2002) zwischen kunstgeschichtlicher Anekdote und fiktionaler (Meta-) Biographie”, University of Bern
-- Feb. 2009: “Stumme Augenzeugen – Funktionen erzählter Fotos in englischsprachigen postkolonialen Romanen aus Südasien”, FRIAS, University of Freiburg i.Br.
-- Feb. 2009: “Seriality in Graphic Novels”, University of Göttingen

* invited the following guest speakers:
-- Dr. Erik Redling, Universität Augsburg
-- PD Dr. Jörn Glasenapp, University of Köln 
-- Dr. Claudia Lillge, University of Paderborn 
-- Helen Zughaib, in collaboration with the US Embassy
-- Dr. Alexa Weik, University of Fribourg 
-- Prof. Dr. Thomas Austenfeld, University of Fribourg 

Manuela Rossini

* published 
-- a monograph entitled From House to Home. Family Matters in Early Modern Drama and Culture. Saarbrücken: Südwestdeutscher Verlag, 2009. 
-- an essay on "ComingTogether: Symbiogenesis and Metamorphosis in Paul di Filippo’s A Mouthful of  Tongues." In: Animal Encounters. Eds. Tom Tyler and Manuela Rossini. Leiden: Brill, 2009. 243-258. 

* co-edited
-- Animal Encounters (together with Tom Tyler). Leiden: Brill, 2009.

* organized 
-- a lecture by Prof. Maria Damon (University of Minnesota) on "Text, Textile, Exile: Mediations on Poetics, Metaphor and Net-work," which took place on June 28 at the Imprimérie, Basel
-- a two-lecture event on "The Ends of Narrative" with Prof. Joseph Tabbi (University of Illinois at Chicago) and Prof. Philipp Schweighauser (University of Basel), which took place on June 29 at the Imprimérie, Basel

Philipp Schweighauser

* organized the SANAS Annual General Meeting & Conference on "Art and Politics in American Culture: Intersections and Perspectives," which took place at the University of Basel, November 21, 2009.

* was an Erasmus Visiting Professor at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München in November 2009, where he gave a talk on Don DeLillo, taught a seminar session on literature and environmental history, held a colloquium on post-apocalyptic fiction, and reported on the Basel Competence Center Cultural Topographies at the research colloquium of the Rachel Carson Center

* published an essay on "Doubly Real: Game Studies and Literary Anthropology; or, Why We Play Games." Eludamos: Journal for Computer Game Culture 3.2 (2009): 115-32. 

* co-edited
-- (with Peter Schneck) the forthcoming essay collection Terrorism, Media, and the Ethics of Fiction: Transatlantic Perspectives on Don DeLillo. New York: Continuum. 
-- (with Gabriele Rippl, Tiina Kirss, Margit Sutrop, and Therese Steffen) the forthcoming essay collection Haunted Narratives: The Politics and Poetics of Identity Formation and 20-Century Life Writing 

* published the following encyclopedia entries:
-- "Don DeLillo, Falling Man." in: Arnold, Heinz Ludwig (Hsg.), Kindlers Literatur Lexikon, 3. rev. Ausgabe. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 485-86.
-- "Don DeLillo, Libra." in: Arnold, Heinz Ludwig (Hsg.), Kindlers Literatur Lexikon, 3. rev. Ausgabe. Stuttgart: Metzler, 2009. 482-83

* gave the following talks:
-- "What's Wrong with Closure? or The Failed Quests of DeLillo's Detectives." Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 2 December 2009.
--  "On the Origins of a Genre: Modernization and the Emergence of the American Novel." Problems of Genre Theory. Annual Conference of the Swiss Association of Comparative Literature (SGAVL). University of Basel, 23-24 October 2009.
-- "Thinking Utopia in Times of Trauma: Reflections on Adorno and Benjamin." 
(Mis-)Representations: Trauma Discourses and Cultural On Productions. Conference at the University of Zürich, 17 October 2009.
-- "Rauschende Kommunikationen: Eine sehr kurze Geschichte der literarischen Akustik im amerikanischen Raum, 1890-1966." /dis/connecting/media/. International Conference at the University of Basel, 4 October 2009.
-- "Don DeLillo and the Ethics of Narrative Closure." The Ends of Narrative. Two-lecture event at the Imprimérie, Basel, 29 June 2009.
-- "Some Reflections on the Place of Aesthetics and Politics in American Studies." Inaugural Lecture at the University of Basel, 19 May 2009.
-- "Game Studies, Literary Anthropology, and Strategies of Distinction; or, Why It Pays to Take Another Look at the Work of Wolfgang Iser." Media in Transition 6, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 24-26 April 2009.

Therese Steffen

* organized the workshop "Cities in Flux: Urbanization and Societal Change in South African Literary Texts." (Basel, 4 Dezember 2009).

* published "Dove, Rita. Sonata Mulattica." New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2009, 229 pp. TheROOT.com; Forthcoming web publication.

* gave talks on
-- "Worlds in Dialogue - Ivan Vladislavic’s Itineraries" (Potchefstroom, SA, 6. Juli 2009)
-- "Rita Dove: Sonata Mulattica" (Johannesburg, 15. Juli 2009).

* co-edited (with Gabriele Rippl, Philipp Schweighauser, and Margit Sutrop) the forthcoming essay collection Haunted Narratives: The Politics and Poetics of Identity Formation and 20-Century Life Writing

* co-organized and contributed to 
-- the graduate colloquium "Körper, Selbsttechnologien und Geschlecht: Entgrenzungen und Begrenzungen" (2008-2011)
-- Swiss-South African Joint Research Project (SSAJRP) transdisziplinäres internationales Projekt
-- "Cities in Flux: Urbanization and Societal Change in South African Literary Texts," a transdisciplinary international project

* was awarded ad personam funding by the Schlettwein Stiftung
Barbara Straumann

* is pursuing her habilitation Embodied Voices: Female Performers in British and American Literature and Culture, c.1850-1930.

* was awarded
-- a grant from the Faculty of Arts at the University of Zurich to spend August 17-19 at the University of Ljubljana, invited by her mentor Prof. Dr. Mladen Dolar,
-- a research grant for advanced researchers from the Swiss National Science Foundation to spend the academic year 2009/10 as a Visiting Scholar at the Department of Germanic Studies, University of Chicago, and as a Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies, University of London.

* published
-- “The Effects of Voice in Isak Dinesen’s ‘The Dreamers.’” Variations 17 (2009): 157-171.
-- “Political Visions: The Two Bodies of Elizabeth I.” The Ritual and Rhetoric of Queenship: Medieval to Early Modern. Ed. Liz Oakley-Brown and Louise Wilkinson. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2009, 252-270. (With Elisabeth Bronfen.)
“Königinnen.” Schauspielhaus Zürich: Beilage zur Saisonvorschau 2009/10 (Summer 2009): 18-19. (With Elisabeth Bronfen.)

* gave the following talks:
-- “Gustave Flauberts Madame Bovary”, invited talk, “Theatergespräche – Anna, Effi, Nora und die anderen: Literarische Frauenporträts des 19. Jahrhunderts”, Städtische Bühnen Münster, February 2, 2009.
-- “A Voice of Her Own? Stimme und weiblicher Selbstausdruck bei Du Maurier, Shaw und Dinesen“, invited talk, international conference “Bild, Stimme II: Figuren des Audiovisuellen”, eikones NFS Bildkritik, University of Basel, March 19-21 2009.
-- “‘There are many that I can be’: The Poetics of Self-Performance in Isak Dinesen’s ‘The Dreamers’”, conference paper, Swiss Association of University Teachers of English SAUTE “Performing the Self: Constructing Premodern and Modern Identities”, University of Fribourg, May 8-9, 2009.
-- “Die Stimme der Diva: Zwischen Himmel und Hölle”, invited talk, international conference “Die Göttliche – Stimme und Diva: Eine Reise an die Grenzen der menschlichen Stimme”, Sächsische Staatsoper Dresden, June 6, 2009.
-- “Elizabeth I. und das kulturelle Imaginäre”, international conference “Königinnen: Macht, Körper, Theatralität”, English Department, University of Zurich, June 12-13, 2009.
-- “Königinnen im Kino”, international conference “Königinnen: Macht, Körper, Theatralität”, English Department, University of Zurich, June 12-13, 2009.
-- “Diva Warhol: Mediale Performance, Gender und Versteckspiel”, invited talk, “Who is that pale man? Impulse, Genealogien, Horizonte – Ringvorlesung zu Wirkung und Relevanz des Werks von Andy Warhol”, Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste in cooperation with Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, December 15, 2009.

* co-organized:
-- “Königinnen: Macht, Körper, Theatralität”, international conference, English Department, University of Zurich, June 12-13, 2009.

Alexa Weik

* was appointed an International Fellow of the Rachel Carson Center for Environmental Studies at the LMU Munich and the Deutsches Museum for the academic year 2010-2011

* was awarded
-- a research grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF) for a “Short Individual Visit” to the U.S. 
-- a travel grant from the Swiss Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences (SAGW) 

* published
-- “Last of the Conquerors. By William Gardner Smith”. The Literary Encyclopedia. Web. August 19, 2009. . 
-- “The Stone Face. By William Gardner Smith”. The Literary Encyclopedia. Web. April 07, 2009. .
 -- “Smith, William Gardner”. The Literary Encyclopedia. Web. January 1, 2009. .

* gave three invited lectures
-- “Unsettled Futures: Ecotopian Visions in American Literature and Film” Lecture and workshop given at the Teacher Training Seminar on “Sustainability: the Future of Our Planet” in Weilburg, Germany, organized by the Center for North American Studies (ZENAF) at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt, Germany, Nov. 6, 2009. 
-- “Apocalypse Now? Global Environmental Change in Popular Ame­rican Film,” Opening Lecture for the 2009 American Studies Student Sympo­sium at the West University of Timisoara, Romania, April 3, 2009.
-- “Confronting The Stone Face: Migration, Race and Cosmopolitan Commit­ment in the Work of William Gardner Smith.” Lecture at the University of Bern, Switzerland, March 17, 2009.

* gave conference talks on
-- “Environmental Justice and the Transcendence of Race-Thinking in Percival Everett’s Watershed.” 125th Annual Convention of the Modern Language Association (MLA) in Philadelphia, USA, December 27-30, 2009. 
-- “Environmental Justice Ecocriticism: Considering Issues of Environmental Injustice in Literature and Film.” CUSO Conference on “Literature and the Environ­ment” at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, Oct. 16-18, 2009. 
 -- “‘Your Planet?’ Emotional Engagement and Perceived Risk in Environmental Disaster Movies.” International conference on “Literature, Art and Culture in an Age of Global Risk” at Cardiff University, United Kingdom, July 2-3, 2009.
-- “Love in the Times of Ecocide in Andrew Stanton’s WALL-E.” 8th ASLE -- Conference at the University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada, June 3-6, 2009.
-- “Still Widening the Circle: the Environmental Challenge to Contemporary Theories of Cosmopolitanism.” Presented at the Pre-Conference Seminar “Ecocriticism, Cosmopolitanism, and Globalization” led by Ursula Heise, Stanford University. 8th ASLE Conference at the University of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada, June 2, 2009. 
-- “The Cosmopolitan as Hero: the Transcendence of Race in Charles W. Chesnutt’s Novels.” 20th Annual Conference of the American Literature Association (ALA), Boston, USA, May 21-24, 2009.
-- “From the Great Plains to the Red Apple Country: Identity and Ecology in the Writings of Zitkala-Ša.” SAUTE Conference, University of Fribourg, Switzerland, May 8-9, 2009.
-- “Mysteries of the Mountain: Environmental Racism and Cosmopolitan Commitment in Percival Everett’s Watershed.” British Association of American Studies (BAAS) Conference at the University of Nottingham, United Kingdom, April 16-19, 2009.