Events
19 Nov 2026
Lecture
Georgia Lummert (ZfL): Angela Rohr – Über Wilmersdorf nach Moskau: Psychoanalyse als Schule des Schreibens
23 Nov 2026
Evening event
Academic Freedom in Georgia – Recent Institutional Dynamics and Emerging Challenges
26 Nov 2026 – 27 Nov 2026
Workshop
Cultural Crossroads: Popular Culture, Diaspora, and the Quest for Belonging
30 Nov 2026
ZfL Lecture
Cornelia Zumbusch (University of Bern): Fausts Sorge. Zur Anthropologie im Anthropozän
10 Dec 2026
Lecture
Nina Weller (ZfL): Dinah Nelken – Heimat auf Widerruf: Wiederentdeckung einer Charlottenburger Schriftstellerin
20 Jan 2027
ZfL Lecture
Helmut Müller-Sievers (University of Colorado Boulder): Buddhistische Literaturforschung?
27 Jan 2027 – 29 Jan 2027
Conference
Von Chatyn bis Tschornobyl. Ales Adamowitschs literarisch-dokumentarisches und menschenrechtliches Schaffen
28 Jan 2027
Lecture
Claude Haas (ZfL): Im Herzen kein Berliner. Erich Maria Remarque und die Figur des Unbekannten Soldaten
The ZfL
The ZfL is a humanities institute for literary research in interdisciplinary contexts that draws from a cultural studies framework. Its methods also engage with the structural transformations within historical-hermeneutic subject areas that have taken place in recent decades. In contrast to the study of literature at universities, predominantly organized by nationality, the ZfL fosters a broad concept of literature, but also uses interdisciplinary tools to fundamentally question the etiology of various literary concepts, their potential for the future, and the relationship between literature and other arts or cultural practices. This is done in the three program area History of Theory, World Literature, Knowledge of Life, and in the key projects.
News
Job advertisement: Acting editor (all genders) for the key project “The 20th Century in Basic Concepts. A Dictionary of Historical Semantics in Germany”
Job advertisement: Student assistant (all genders) for the project “Reproduction, Labor, Aesthetics. Breastfeeding and Literature in the Long Nineteenth Century”
Neu in the media center: Picture gallery of the panel discussion “KI, Narrative und die Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit”
Research
History of Theory
analyzes the genealogy of theory and develops innovative forms of historicizing it.
read moreWorld Literature
disusses the global interrelations of literature and its potential to shape the world.
read moreKnowledge of Life
investigates the knowlege of life in historical and interdisciplinary respects.
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