Fotis Jannidis

Simone Winko

Gerhard Lauer

Matias Martinez

Theoretical debate has declared the author obsolete. In practice, however, certain usages of the author concept are repeatedly demonstrated as being legitimate. This discrepancy suggests that theoretical reflection on the author fails to do justice to central forms of the scholarly approach to literature. The articles in this volume take both systematic and historical perspectives on this controversial term in an attempt to accurately reconstruct the history of the concept and to analyze the problem constellations generated by it in practice. The discussion also extends to non-literary media such as film, music, art, and hypertexts.

Zur Erneuerung eines umstrittenen Begriffs

Rückkehr des Autors

David Kettler

The history of American universities is punctuated by shifts in the terms on which the mission of higher education is defined and debated. A dramatic moment with lasting effects came with the introduction of German-speaking exile intellectuals in the Hitler era. In Germany, the academic culture of the early twentieth century was torn by the struggle between Wissenschaft and Bildung, two symbolic German terms, whose lack of precise English equivalents is a sign of the different configuration in America. The studies in this book examine the achievements of numerous influential émigré intellectuals against the background of their mediation between the two cultural traditions in science and liberal studies. In showing the richness of reciprocal influences, the book challenges claims about the disruptive influence of exile culture on the American mind.

The Contested Legacies of German Émigré Intellectuals

Exile, Science, and Bildung

Matías Martínez

'Bedeutung' ist ein Grundbegriff literaturwissenschaftlichen Arbeitens. Jede interpretierende Aussage über einen literarischen Text setzt Annahmen darüber voraus, auf welche Weise literarische Texte Bedeutung erzeugen, vermitteln oder veranlassen können. In der Literaturtheorie und Ästhetik der letzten Jahrzehnte wurden verschiedene Bedeutungskonzeptionen entwickelt. Eine allgemein akzeptierte Klärung des Begriffs steht bislang aus. Der Band soll zu einer solchen Klärung führen. Seine internationalen Beiträger nehmen die ältere Diskussion auf und suchen nach interdisziplinären Integrationsmöglichkeiten für eine Präzisierung des Begriffs. Ansätze zur Bestimmung des Bedeutungsbegriffs aus Psychologie und Linguistik, Philosophie und Soziologie sowie aus musikwissenschaftlicher, filmhermeneutischer und medientheoretischer Sicht werden mit verschiedenen literaturwissenschaftlichen Perspektiven verbunden. Aus dem Inhalt: I. Sprachliche und sprachanalytische Aspekte der 'Bedeutung' II. Literatur- und kulturwissenschaftliche Konzepte von 'Bedeutung' III. Mediale Konstitution von 'Bedeutung' IV. Historische Aspekte literarischer 'Bedeutung'

zur Theorie der Bedeutung literarischer Texte

Regeln der Bedeutung

Martin Huber

The project of writing a social history of literature is generally held to have exhausted its potential. Yet the general practice of literary studies still encompasses socio-historical issues like the relationship between literary texts and their social environment, studies on the distribution of literature, questions pertaining to the historical and social status of authors and readers. The articles in this volume essay a stock-taking of the (now historical) paradigm 'social history of literature' and by engaging critically with approaches from cultural studies and media theory outline new concepts for literary studies 'after social history'.

Konzepte für eine Literaturwissenschaft zwischen Historischer Anthropologie, Kulturgeschichte und Medientheorie

Nach der Sozialgeschichte

Hans-Edwin Friedrich

Michael Ansel

Thomas Mann is regarded as the best-known representative of modern German literature. This exceptional status is the result of very conscious work on his own profile. How did Thomas Mann manage to achieve this status as the representative of German literature? Which categories did he use to reflect on his role as a writer? And which alliances or conflicts determined the perception he had of himself and others had of him? What was the part played by his publishers, by German scholars and journalists in the augmentation of his fame? The answers to these questions show how Thomas Mann and both his patrons and his rivals worked to invent him as a writer. They open a new perspective on Thomas Mann and his work.

Die Erfindung des Schriftstellers Thomas Mann

The concept of "literature" is notoriously vague and defies definition, yet at the same time it is indispensable in an age where traditional subject boundaries are breaking down. This volume discusses possible ways of defining the concept in such a manner that it can be productively deployed heuristically in varied historical and cultural contexts. At the same time, phenomena such as fictionality and literaricity are taken as the starting point for a search for common features of literature.

zu Begriff und Phänomen des Literarischen

Grenzen der Literatur

Literaturwissenschaftliche Beiträge zur Generationsforschung

Geschichte einer kleinen Aufklärung

Die Rückseite der Haskala

The volume Regeln der Bedeutung ('Rules of meaning') marks the launch of Revisionen, a projected series of some eight volumes on basic concepts of literary theory. The series aims to reflect on central concepts of literary studies which have become questionable or problematic in the course of recent debates and to open up new perspectives on them in order to make them available for research in a new manner.

Gerhard Lauer

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