DDGC 2025 Conference Program

Interdependence and Solidarity Formations

in German Studies and the Arts

April 10-12, 2025 (Online)

All session times are listed in Eastern Daylight Time

Advanced registration is required. 

THURSDAY, APRIL 10, 2025

9:30am-10:00am

Welcome, Arrival, Introduction to Conference Theme

  • Jeannette Oholi (Dartmouth College) & Ervin Malakaj (University of British Columbia)


10:00am-11:30am

Theme: Narratives of Interdependence and Solidarity

Moderator: Priscilla Layne (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill)

  • “Jewish-Muslim Solidarity in Contemporary German Culture” Joseph Twist (University College Dublin) (20 minute presentation)

  • “'Doing Solidarity'? The German-speaking Reception of African American Modernist Poetry in the Long 1920s” Alexandra Dempe (University of Tübingen) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Translocality, Popularity and Cultural Transfers: US Hip-Pop Culture as Mediator between Chinese and German Rap Song Productions” Yejun Zou (Sun Yat-sen University) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Shards of Memory: The Diversity of Intergenerational Trauma in Contemporary Germany” Leonie Ettinger (Free University of Berlin) (10 minute presentation)

  • “My, Your, Our Story? Insights from Collective Storytelling at the Bürgerrat Klima.” Julia Ludewig (Allegheny College) (10 minute presentation)


11:30am-12:30pm

Break


12:30pm-2:00pm

Theme: Solidarity Programming in DDGC & DDFC

Moderator: Beverly Weber (University of Colorado Boulder)

  • “DDFC and the Shift Toward Solidarity Programming for Change.” Siham Bouamer (University of Cincinnati) & Hasheem Hakeem (Northwestern University) (20 minutes presentation)

  • “DDGC Mutual Aid Network and the Praxis of Interconnectedness in German Studies” Nichole Neuman (University of Indiana Indianapolis) (10 minutes presentation)

  • “DDGC Writes and Cross-Hierarchical Solidarities” Hannah V. Eldridge (University of Wisconsin Madison) & Cynthia Shin (University of Indiana Bloomington) (10  minute presentation)

  • “DDGC Research Cooperatives and Supports for Alternative Research Infrastructures” Suzuko Knott (Connecticut College) (10 minutes presentation)


2:15pm-3:15pm

Theme: Recipes for Alternative Futures

Moderator: Jeannette Oholi (Dartmouth College)

  • A community dialogue & collective imagining session about food, solidarity, and radical futures with Bradley Boovy (Oregon State University), Maria Stehle (University of Tennessee), & Beverly Weber (University of Colorado) 


FRIDAY, APRIL 11, 2025

10:00am-11:30am

Theme: Interdependence and Solidarity Between the Field and Cultural Production

Moderator: Jeannette Oholi (Dartmouth College)

  • “Schwarze Ästhetiken in der deutschsprachigen Literatur und die Bedeutung von Literaturfestivals am Beispiel der Popup-Werkstatt Schwarze deutsche literarische Perspektiven” Yeama Bangali (20 minute presentation)

  • “The Arts: Cultural and Educational Landscapes and Productions: Evaluations of an Empowerment Project with Insights from a Practitioner's Point of View” Patience Amankwah (University of Bremen) (20 minutes)

  • “Recontextualizing the Canon for an Inclusive Reorientation of German Studies” Timothy Brown (University of Tübingen) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Literary Interventions and Political Writing: Allyship and Solidarity in Contemporary Germany” Laura Marie Sturtz (University of Erlangen-Nürnberg/Columbia University) (10 minute presentation)


11:30am-12:30pm

Break


12:30pm-2:00pm

Theme: From Petrification to Dynamic Solidarity: Animapolitics as Theory and Practice 

Moderator: Cynthia Shin (Indiana University Bloomington)

  • “Living Together: Animapolitics” Sarah Colvin (University of Cambridge) (20 minutes presentation)

  • “Shimmering, Glistening, Moving: Vitalising Aesthetic Experiments in the German Literature of the 21st Century” Alrik Daldrup (University of Cambridge) (20 minutes presentation)

  • “Animapolitics and Public Intellectuals: Network Solidarity and Chained Actions in the German Literary Sphere” Tara Talwar Windsor (University of Cambridge) (20 minutes presentation) 


2:15pm-3:15pm

Theme: Memory and Solidarity 

Moderator: Regine Criser (University of North Carolina, Asheville)

  • “‘Our lives, our profit’ – VietGermans Claim the History of Contract Workers” Katrin Bahr (Centre College) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Yiddish Third World Solidarity and Memory Work” Miriam Chorley-Schulz (University of Oregon) (10 minute presentation)

  • “The ‘Cruel Optimism’ of Mnemonic Frameworks of the Holocaust” Shoshana Schwebel & Braden Russell (University of British Columbia) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Connective Methodologies and Missed Connections in Cultural Memory Studies” Jason Groves (University of Washington) (10 minute presentation)


3:15pm-5:00pm

Chit-Chat with Jeannette and Ervin


5:00pm-6:30pm

Theme: Emerging Perspectives on Solidarity

Moderator: Beverly Weber (University of Colorado Boulder)

  • “‘We Dey’: Amoako Boafo, Belinda Kazeem-Kamiński and the Reinvention of the Austrian Portraiture Tradition” Luca Arens (Columbia University) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Bicycle Greenwishing: Images of Sustainability and Infrastructures of Solidarity in Munich and Berlin” Seth Peabody (Carleton College) & Jennifer Hosek (Queen’s University) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Indigenous Knowledges in/and German Studies: Reckoning with Solidarity and Incommensurability” Maureen Gallagher (Australian National University) (20 minute presentation)

SATURDAY, APRIL 12, 2025 

10:00am-11:30am

Theme: Formations of Interdependence and Solidarity Networks

Moderator: Regine Criser (University of North Carolina, Asheville)

  • “Solidarität und Genozid. Zu erzählerischen Verbindungslinien zwischen dem Genozid an den Tutsi Ruandas und der Shoah” Anne D. Peiter (Université de La Réunion) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Networking Weimar Film Studies: Opportunities and Limits” Lawrence Alexander (University of Oxford) & Molly Harrabin (University of Warwick) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Movida Americana: How to Bring a Culture Back From Fascism” Joseph L. V. Donica (Bronx Community College, CUNY) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Memories from the Margins: Rethinking Narratives in narratif” Hazar Oghan (University of Geneva) (10 minute presentation)


11:30am-12:30pm

Break


12:30pm-1:30pm

Theme: Envisioning Future Interdependence and Solidarity in the Field

Moderator: Ervin Malakaj (University of British Columbia)

  • “Being Stupid Together: The (Peri-)Menopausal Brain in the Seminar Room” Barbara Nagel (Princeton University) (10 minute presentation)

  • “Critical Virtual Exchange on Palestine, Israel, and Germany: Attempts to Decolonize the Foreign Language Teacher Training Curriculum” Fabian Krengel (University of Regensburg) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Dependency Studies and Crises of Interdependency in Higher Education” Evan Torner (University of Cincinnati) (10 minute presentation)


1:45pm-3:00pm

Theme: Theoretical Reflection on the Glossary of Interdependence and Solidarity for German Studies

Moderator: Cynthia Shin (Indiana University Bloomington)

  • “LIVE LAUGH LUIGI: Aus der Krankheit eine Waffe machen” Maggie Rosenau (University of Colorado Denver & Boulder) & kelly j. drumright (University of Colorado Boulder) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Care and Love: Visions of Solidarity” Adrienne Merritt (University of Colorado Boulder) (20 minute presentation)

  • “Multitude of German Speaking: Expanding voices of Central Asian German Studies” Zhanar Beketova (University of Pennsylvania) (10 minute presentation)


3:15pm-4:15pm

Theme: Coping and Hoping: Competing Desires, Artistic Action and the Neoliberal University

Moderator: Ervin Malakaj (University of British Columbia)

  • A community dialogue with Barbara Schmenk (University of Waterloo) & Janice McGregor (University of Arizona) 


4:30-5:00pm

Closing Remarks 

  • Jeannette Oholi (Dartmouth College) & Ervin Malakaj (University of British Columbia)