CLA: Cultural Studies & Comparative Literature

Congratulations are in order!

EMILY FEDORUK has been awarded with the Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellowship by the University of Minnesota Graduate School 2013-2014

And

AKSHYA SAXENA has been awarded with the Interdisciplinary Doctoral Fellowship by the University of Minnesota Graduate School 2013-2014

Best wishes for a rewarding and productive fellowship!

A congratulations is in order to CSCL Major Matthew Laska who has been awarded a Selmer Birkelo Scholarship by the College of Liberal Arts.

Congratulations are in order!

Andrea Gyenge has been awarded a Hella Mears Graduate Fellowship by the Center for German and East European Studies

AND

Marla Zubel has been awarded a Summer Research Fellowship by the Center for Austrian Studies

Best wishes for a rewarding and productive fellowship tenure!

Born in Salzgitter, Germany, Jochen received his Ph.D. in 1968 from the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Germany, where he would complete his Habilitiation in 1976. He first came to the University of Minnesota already in 1968-69 to teach on an exchange. In 1978 he was hired by what was then the German Department (now GSD); within a year he was promoted to full Professor. He soon was teaching for both German and the Department of Comparative Literature (now the Department of Cultural Studies & Comparative Literature, or CSCL); at one point he served as chair of Comparative Literature. For both departments, his teaching, like his scholarship, covered a wide range of subjects in German and European literary, aesthetic, and cultural theory and history: from Kant, Schiller, and German Romanticism to Lacan, poststructuralism, and the postmodern.

An internationally recognized scholar of German cultural and intellectual history, he authored seven books on literary theory and criticism, and he helped establish Minnesota as a center for innovative research in German Studies and Comparative Literature. As co-editor of the University of Minnesota Press's acclaimed series, "The Theory and History of Literature," he introduced many European literary and cultural theorists to the American academy. He co-founded the journal Cultural Critique. His devotion to social justice and independent thinking endeared him to his students, who honored him with a colloquium in 2011 titled "Felix Aestheticus," the happy aesthetic practitioner.

He will be sorely missed by his colleagues at the University of Minnesota and by generations of students he taught and mentored.

A memorial service has been planned for Saturday, March 9 at 4:00 PM in the Macalester chapel.

Contributions to the the Jochen Schulte-Sasse Fellowship in German Studies may go to the University of Minnesota Foundation, C-M 3854, P.O. Box 70870, St. Paul, MN 55170. More information: http://www.giving.umn.edu/giving_opps/outright_gifts/index.html.

Read "In Memoriam: Jochen Schulte-Sasse (1940-2012)" in The German Quarterly (PDF)

The Childhood and Youth Studies Collaborative critically looks at the socio-historical constructions of children and transitions to adulthood, child-parent relations, and modern discourses and representations of childhood and adolescence.

Organized by Kysa Hubbard, a lecturer in the Department of Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature, and M. J. Maynes, a professor in the Department of History, the Collaborative seeks to bring a historical-cultural understanding to the study of childhood and adolescence. The universal model of childhood development obscures the reality that children's experiences of, and adult's ideas about childhood vary by culture and time, explain Maynes and Hubbard.

For further information see: http://ias.umn.edu/2012/08/26/childhood-and-youth/

The Department of Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature, College of Liberal Arts, University of Minnesota, invites applications for a full-time, tenure-track position beginning fall semester 2013. As a theoretically-oriented, comparatist, interdisciplinary department whose research and teaching span word/image/sound, we seek scholars with specific training in, and who work across, two or more of these areas.

Ideal candidates will be those forging innovative and productive connections across disciplines and boundaries. They will have specific expertise - engaging a global perspective yet anchored within a particular historical context - in one or preferably more of the following areas: comparative intellectual histories of Western and non-Western cultures from the eighteenth century onward; critical musicology and sound studies; social/cultural politics of networks and/or networked media; theories and histories of the moving image; and comparative and world literatures, preferably with emphasis on non-Western cultures and traditions. Ideal candidates will be trained in intellectual history, music, media studies, moving image studies, or literature primarily, and will have done solid research in one of the other areas, combining them in novel ways. Fluency in one or more modern European languages and/or one or more modern non-European languages is required.
Appointment will be 100%-time over the nine-month academic year. Appointment will be at the rank of tenure-track assistant professor
Candidates will be evaluated according to a) overall quality of their academic preparation, b) relevance of their research to the department's academic priorities and fields of inquiry, c) evidence of commitment to teaching and skills as a teacher, as well as d) strength of recommendations.
In order for the application to be considered, a cover letter, curriculum vitae, and list of references must be submitted to the University of Minnesota's employment application web site: https://employment.umn.edu (use requisition number 179645). All completed applications must be submitted by October 22, 2012. Applicants may be solicited at a later stage for a writing sample and three letters of recommendation.

Congratulations to Professor Tim Brennan, who will deliver two keynote
addresses this fall: at the "Crafts of World Literature" conference at
Oxford in September, and at the "Negative Cosmopolitanism" conference in
Edmonton in October.

Also to Professor John Archer, who will deliver a keynote address at the
meeting of the International Association for the Study of Traditional
Environments in Portland in October.

The Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature program is proud to help
announce the launch of a new website www.RediscoveringJohnBerryman.com for the former (now deceased) Professor of the Humanities.

Minnesota Made Productions is in progress on a feature documentary inspired by both John Berryman and the recently awakened interest in musical circles and other artistic groups of poets. So far this interest has led the filmmakers to gather archival footage, some never before seen film, and conduct a few interviews with musicians [Will Sheff of Okkervil River, Craig Finn of The Hold Steady, and the composer, Janika Vandervelde] among others. For up to date information on the project as it progresses, visit the website
(www.RediscoveringJohnBerryman.com
) and the Facebook fan page for Rediscovering John Berryman."

Friday, November 11, 2011 at 2:00 p.m.
Lind 207a
Refreshments will be served.

Please join us for a presentation by Hina Nazar, Associate Professor of English at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Dr. Nazar specializes in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British fiction, moral philosophy, feminist theory, and critical theory. Her book Enlightened Sentiments: Judgment and Autonomy in the Age of Sensibility was published this year by Fordham University Press.

Co-sponsored with the Department of English, the Coca Cola Activity Initiative, and GAPSA.

For more information contact us at nineteen@umn.edu.

Linda Wilbrecht, PhD, (B.A. Cultural Studies & Comparative Literature, 1995) a neuroscientist at the Ernest Gallo Clinic and Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), is one of 94 researchers named today by President Obama as a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Wilbrecht, UCSF assistant professor of neurology, will receive the award in recognition of the promise she has demonstrated as a scientist and her research program on the effects of stimulants, such as cocaine, on the development of neural circuits in the brains of rodents. The research is supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The overall goal of Wilbrecht's research is to uncover the effects of drug use and stress on the development of neural circuits, and to develop strategies to mitigate drug dependence.

PECASE is the highest honor given by the United States government to science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers. The winners, who will be presented with their awards by the President at a White House ceremony in October, receive research grants of up to five years to further studies that support critical government missions.

Sixteen Federal departments and agencies join together annually to nominate candidates for the PECASE award. Candidates are selected for their pursuit of innovative research at the frontiers of science and technology and their commitment to community service as demonstrated through scientific leadership, public education or community outreach.

Neural circuits of the frontal cortex are known to be refined and rewired during adolescence, suggesting that adolescence may be a critical period for higher brain functions such as learning, judgment and decision making.

"It is clear that drugs can change the strength of neural circuits," said Wilbrecht, "and that exposure to drugs during development may have a particularly strong impact on the brain." The challenge now, she said, "is to sort out which specific circuits are altered, so that we can harness neural plasticity - the ability of the brain to dynamically alter synaptic connections - to move the brain back towards a pre-addiction state."

Wilbrecht became interested in the concept of developmental critical periods at age 15, while studying with Harvey Sarles, PhD, at the University of Minnesota. She then studied psychology and philosophy at Oxford University, where she worked on animal models of schizophrenia under Susan Iversen, PhD. Her doctoral research focused on mechanisms underlying the sensitive period for song learning in songbirds with Fernando Nottebohm, PhD, at Rockefeller University. As a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Karel Svoboda at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Dr. Michael Merzenich at UCSF, Wilbrecht focused on how changes in experience affect synapses in the rodent brain.

In 2008, Wilbrecht was invited to establish her own laboratory at the Gallo Center. Her research group studies the impact of experience on the development of the frontal cortex, executive function and decision making.

"Most people would agree adolescence is a formative moment in our lives," Wilbrecht said. "Our sense of self, our personality, our likes and dislikes, our musical taste, all seem to take more definitive shape during this time. However, if we start out on the wrong foot early in life, it is also harder to change as an adult. I'd like to know why this happens at a biological level and use this information to develop therapies for addiction and other conditions associated with early life adversity."

In 2009, Wilbrecht received the BioBehavioral Research Award for Innovative New Investigators (BRAINs) from the National Institute of Mental Health.