A conversation with Paula Friedericke Hartmann, Clemens Räthel, Eckhard Schumacher, Charlotte Steinert and Alexander Waszynski (Universität Greifswald): How to do things with peripeties? Interdisciplinary approaches to the Baltic Sea Region

The DFG International Research Training Group 2560 “Baltic Peripeties. Narratives of Reformations, Revolutions and Catastrophes” (Greifswald, Tartu, Trondheim) explores turning points in the histories and cultures of the Baltic Sea Region. The concept of “peripety”, which we understand as a contested zone of decisive change in narrative, serves as a tool to examine shifting expectations, narrative escalations, and conflicting versions in literatures, politics, commemorative practices, body cultures, and historiographies. This keynote panel will present the ongoing research and preliminary findings of two doctoral projects, and will identify fields of future interdisciplinary study.

Paula Friedericke Hartmann is a doctoral researcher at the IRTG Baltic Peripeties at the University of Greifswald. She holds a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in German Literature and Culture from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim. Her current research focuses on the storytelling potential of graphic novels, particularly in their representation of historical crimes. In her PhD project, she examines how graphic novels depict the narratives of perpetrators and victims within the context of the "Third Generation", exploring how these works engage with historical events and their representation in contemporary culture.

 

Clemens Räthel holds the chair of Modern Scandinavian Literatures at the University of Greifswald. In his research he focuses on Scandinavian theatre, opera and literature from the 19th century to today. He is also interested in queer perspectives on the welfare state inm literature and theatre, contemporary opera architecture and Jewish-Scandinavian relations. He is the speaker of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Baltic Sea Region Research (IFZO) and, together with Prof. Pantermöller, director of the annual festival Nordischer Klang in Greifswald.

Eckhard Schumacher obtained his doctorate in Bielefeld – with a dissertation on the notion of incomprehensibility in literary theory – and his habilitation in the field of contemporary literature and pop culture at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. He has been Professor of Modern German Literature and Literary Theory at the University of Greifswald since 2009. He is director of the Wolfgang Koeppen Archives and, since 2021, spokesperson of the IRTG Baltic Peripeties. Schumacher’s research and teaching interests include literature and media theory, romanticism, pop culture, the genre of “Wenderoman” as well as narratives of the Baltic Sea.

 

 

Charlotte Steinert has been a doctoral researcher at the IRTG Baltic Peripeties at the University of Greifswald since april 2024. She holds a Bachelor's degree in political science and public law from the university of Trier and a Master's degree in Scandinavian Studies from the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
In her PhD project, she explores if and how the way that Swedish mainstream parties reference the right-wing populist party Sverigedemokraterna has changed since 2010 by analyzing political speeches from the annual event of Almedalen. Additionally, she is interested in exploring possible connections between these narratives and discourses about racism and national identity.

 

 

Alexander Waszynski is the academic coordinator of the IRTG Baltic Peripeties. In his research, he focuses on methodologies, literary theory and media theory, with an emphasis on the German literary and intellectual history from the 18th to the 20th century. He has published on Jean Paul, Theodor Fontane, Hans Blumenberg, on contemporary cinema and the history of science.