Aktuelle Veranstaltungen

• 2024 WS

  • Writing in Troubled Times: English Literature in the Seventeenth Century
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • Tale of the Gael event
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Give me my Romeo! William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
  • The Extra Slot: Offenes Oberseminar
  • Going to Hell: John Milton, Paradise Lost

Vergangene Veranstaltungen

• 2024 SS

  • In Verse my Love to Show: Renaissance Love Poetry
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Extra Slot: Offenes Oberseminar
  • East is East, and West is West?: Rudyard Kipling
  • "To be, or not to be": Shakespeare, Hamlet
  • Decline and Fall: The Ancient World and the British Imagination
  • ZAG71050 Modul Lit1, Version C (students studying BA Angloph. Studies or BA KuWi/): Introduction to Literary Studies, A History of American Lit.+Cult., A History of British Lit.+Cult.
  • ZAG71050 Modul Lit1, Version A (students studying LA BA/Lehramt): Introduction to Literary Studies, A History of American Lit.+Cult., ZAG71050 Modul Lit1, Version B (students studying LA BA/Lehramt): Introduction to Literary Studies, A History of Briti

• 2023 WS

  • The Extra Slot: Offenes Oberseminar
  • Put the Kettle on: Tea and other Hot Drinks in British Culture and Literature
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Some Rise by Sin, and Some by Virtue Fall: Shakespeare, Measure by Measure
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • ZAG71050 Version C - Introduction to Literary Studies – Einzelansicht
  • ZAG71050 Version A und ZAG71050 Version B - Introduction to Literary Studies – Einzelansicht
  • ZAG12045 Intercultural and Professional Contexts of British and Postcolonial Studies
  • Dark Thoughts: Melancholy in Early Modern English Literature, Music and Art

• 2023 SS

  • A Day in Dublin: James Joyce, Ulysses
  • The Extra Slot: Offenes Oberseminar
  • We Band of Brothers: Shakespeare, Henry V
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • East is East, and West is West?: Rudyard Kipling
  • They met at the Fitzroy Tavern: London's Unconventional Literary and Cultural Scene (1920s-1950s)
  • ZAG71050 „Lit1, Version C (BA Angloph. Studies or BA KuWi/): Intro Lit. Studies, History of American Lit.+Cult., History of British Lit.+Cult.
  • ZAG20101 „Intro Lit. Studies/Ling., ZAG71050 „Lit1, Version A (LA BA/Lehramt): Intro Lit. Studies, History of American Lit.+Cult.", ZAG71050 „Lit1, Version B (LA BA/Lehramt): Intro Lit. Studies, History of British Lit.+Cult."

• 2022 WS

  • I am not what I am: William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
  • The First Romantic Scottish Superstar: Robert Burns
  • ZAG12045 Intercultural and Professional Contexts of British and Postcolonial Studies
  • The Extra Slot: Offenes Oberseminar
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life: Boswell and Johnson
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Conviviality and Sociability in the Long Eighteenth Century: Restoration to Romanticism (LAPASEC 2023 conference)
  • ZAG71050 Version C: Introduction to Literary Studies, A History of American Lit. + Cult., A History of British Lit. + Cult.
  • ZAG71050 Version A und Version B: Introduction to Literary Studies, A History of American or British Lit. + Cult.; ZAG20101 Introduction to Literary Studies / Linguistics

• 2022 SS

  • ZAG71050 Lit1, Version A

• 2021 WS

  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • A Poet of Pleasure: Robert Herrick
  • English Literature in the Eighteenth Century
  • Exit, pursued by a bear: William Shakespeare, The Winter´s Tale
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics

• 2021 SS

  • Writing in Troubled Times: English Literature in the Seventeenth Century
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Let me play the lion too! William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night´s Dream
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • This Bright,This Beautiful World: British Perceptions of India, 1583-1947
  • Going to Hell: John Milton, Paradise Lost

• 2020 WS

  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • The European Dimension of Romanticism: Byron, Heine, Pushkin
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • Howl, howl, howl, howl! William Shakespeare, King Lear
  • Wit, Elegance and Shit-Diving: Alexander Pope

• 2020 SS

  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Isle is full of Noises: Shakespeare's Tempest
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • The flea is you and I: John Donne
  • Metropolis: London in the 19th Century (with study tour to London) Gr. 2
  • Metropolis: London in the 19th Century (with study tour to London) Gr. 1

• 2019 WS

  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • Value yourselves! - Female Poets of the 18th Century
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Writing in Troubled Times: English Literature in the 17th Century
  • Do not fall in love with me! - Shakespeare, As You Like It
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 5
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies

• 2019 SS

  • A Day in Dublin: James Joyce, Ulysses.
  • Men were deceivers ever: Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing
  • The Godfather of the Graphic Novel: William Hogarth (With study tour to London)
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • English Literature in the 18th Century

• 2018 WS

  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • These Violent Delights Have Violent Ends: Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet
  • Put the Kettle on! Tea and Other Hot Drinks in British Culture and Literature from the 17th Century to the Present
  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Flakes of Life: Philip Larkin's Poetry
  • Thinking Green Thoughts: Andrew Marvell and 17th-Century England

• 2018 SS

  • If I be waspish, best beware my sting: Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew
  • Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone: W. H. Auden´s Poetry
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Tiddely Pom! Winnie the Pooh, Alice in Wonderland and Literary Theory
  • Beigels and Blogs, Huguenots and Hipsters: Spitalfields and its Transformations (with study tour to London)

• 2017 WS

  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The green-ey'd monster: Shakespeare's Othello
  • Better to reign in hell than to serve in heaven: John Milton, Paradise Lost
  • Music in a Snowy Street: Thomas Hardy's Poetry
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • Int. and Prof. Contexts
  • This bright, this beautiful world: British Perceptions of India, 1583-1947

• 2017 SS

  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • Beer and Witches: Robert Burns
  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Decline and Fall: The Ancient World and the British Imagination Gr. 2
  • Decline and Fall: The Ancient World and the British Imagination Gr. 1
  • Elizabethans in Elsinore: Shakespeare, Hamlet
  • Mess up the Mess: John Betjeman's England

• 2016 WS

  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Scottish Play: Shakespeare, "Macbeth"
  • By Day Serpent, by Night Vampire: London in Verse
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • BP3-Modulabschlussklausur
  • Changed beyond Recognition: Industrialisation and Deindustrialisation in Cultural and Literary History
  • English Literature in the 18th Century

• 2016 SS

  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies

• 2015 WS

  • Research and Doctoral Colloquium: British and North American Literary and Cultural Studies
  • From Lilliput to Brobdingnag: Jonathan Swift
  • Glasgow Zen: New Scottish Poetry
  • London in Maps: From Sixteenth-century Woodcuts to Present-day Digital Resources
  • The Extra Slot: Selected Research Topics
  • A Poet and his Pet Pig: Robert Herrick

• 2015 SS

  • Elizabethans in Love: William Shakespeare, "A Midsummer Night's Dream"
  • The Godfather of the Graphic Novel: William Hogarth
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 4
  • Spooky! Ghosts and the Supernatural in English Literature (from the 17th Century to the Present)
  • Grundkurs Literaturwissenschaft (Introduction to Literary Studies) Gr. 3

• 2014 WS

  • How to Be a Lady/Gentleman (and Many Other Things Besides): Conduct Books
  • Alexander Pope
  • Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: English Musical Humour from the Seventeenth Century to Monty Python
  • Doctoral Colloquium in Literary and Cultural Studies
  • The Restoration: Literature, Culture and Everyday Life in a Period of Change
  • Modulklausur Anglophone Master
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • How to Be a Lady/Gentleman (and Many Other Things Besides): Conduct Books
  • Always Look on the Bright Side of Life: English Musical Humour from the Seventeenth Century to Monty Python

• 2014 SS

  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Colloquium for Doctoral Students in Anglophone Literary and Cultural Studies
  • To acquire some knowledge of the place: Real and Imaginary Visitors to Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century London
  • A kingdom for a stage, and princes to act: Shakespeare and Kingship (Henry V and King Lear)
  • Go and catch a falling star: John Donne

• 2013 WS

  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Informationsveranstaltung für Erstsemester
  • Byron, Heine, Pushkin: The European Dimension of Romanticism
  • Stumbling on Melons: Andrew Marvell
  • Doktorandenkolloquium: Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften
  • The East End of London: Past and Present
  • Institutsversammlung
  • Klausur Modul VI BA
  • Institutsversammlung Anglistik
  • Modulabschlussklausur
  • E3 - GeiWi_Angl - The East End of London: Past and Present - Cr. 3-3

• 2013 SS

  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • In Verse my Love to Show: Elizabethan Love Poetry
  • Culture in the Coffee-House: The Spectator
  • Doktorandenkolloquium: Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften
  • Institutsversammlung
  • Informationsveranstaltung für LaBa-Studierende des 2. Semesters - Studieren am Institut für anglophone Studien 101
  • Reserve Heyl
  • Reserve Heyl
  • 18th-Century English Literature
  • Exkursionsvorbesprechung

• 2012 WS

  • Shakespeare's Romances: "The Tempest" and "The Winter's Tale"
  • When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life: Boswell and Johnson
  • Pflichtvorlesung: Introduction to Literary Studies
  • Informationsveranstaltung für Erstsemester
  • Of Satan's Party? John Milton, Part II
  • Institutsversammlung Anglistik
  • Doktorandenkolloquium: Anglophone Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften

• 2012 SS

  • James Joyce
  • John Milton
  • London: A Literary/Cultural History from its Beginnings to the Present
  • The Great Fire of London: Making Sense of an Early Modern Disaster (with study tour to London)
  • Doktorandenkolloquium für Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften
  • Robert Fergusson, Robert Burns and Eighteenth-Century Edinburgh

• 2011 WS

  • The Pre-History of Crime Fiction: Early Modern Textual and Pictorial Narratives of Urban Crime
  • Who are we? Contemporary Scottish Literature and Culture
  • The "German Colony" in London, 1848-1945: Cultural and Literary Perspectives on Emigration and Exile
  • Eighteenth-Century Women Writers: Gender Roles and Female Authorship

Die folgenden Publikationen sind in der Online-Universitätsbibliographie der Universität Duisburg-Essen verzeichnet. Weitere Informationen finden Sie gegebenenfalls auch auf den persönlichen Webseiten der Person.

2015

July 2015: Received the 2015 Lehrpreis der Universität Duisburg-Essen (the university's award for excellence in academic teaching).

2012-2014

October 2012 - September 2014: Head of Department

2011 – present

Full professor at the University of Duisburg-Essen
(Chair of British Literature and Culture).

2006 – 2011

Temporary appointments at several German universities: stand-in for Ratsstellen at Otto Friedrich-Universität, Bamberg and Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Mainz; visiting professor at the University of Regensburg and Humboldt-Universität, Berlin (twice).

2006

Habilitation: Worlds of Wonders: Sammelndes Schreiben und schreibendes Sammeln im England des 17. Jahrhunderts (Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main). Post-doctoral thesis about connections between the culture of collecting (cabinets of curiosities), literature and the visual arts in the seventeenth century.

From 2001

Lecturer (C1) at Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main.

2000

Ph. D.: A Passion for Privacy: Untersuchungen zur Genese der bürgerlichen Privatsphäre in London, ca. 1660-1800 (Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main). Thesis on the rise of the private sphere in eighteenth-century London and the impact of emerging concepts of privacy on literature and art of the period.

Teaching post (Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter) at the University of Frankfurt. Extended stays in London on a regular basis to do research for Ph. D. and Habilitation (all in all several years), attached to the German Historical Institute and the School of Advanced Study, University College London. Research grants awarded by German Historical Institute, German Academic Exchange Service and other funding bodies.

1993

Staatsexamen in English and History (Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main).

From 1986

Studied English and History at Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt am Main and the University of Reading

1985-86

Non-military national service

Proposals for Ph.D. projects in the followings fields would be particularly welcome: Early Modern Studies (literature and culture of the 17^th and long 18^th century) / Urban Studies, especially: London, Edinburgh / Scottish literature and culture / cultural relations between Britain and Germany / cultural relations between Britain and India / literature and the visual arts in the early modern period.

I would be happy to supervise BA/MA theses related to topics listed below.

Earliest Beginnings to Middle Ages

• London’s cultural and literary history.

The 16^th and 17^th Century

• The culture of collecting (cabinets of curiosities) and related phenomena in English literature. Texts as collections, collections as texts. Interactions between collecting, early global exploration and early scientific research. Transformations of obsolete knowledge. (Specific collectors: the Tradescants, Sir Thomas Browne, the Royal Society).
• London in the seventeenth century. The Great Plague and the Great Fire; pre- and post-Fire architecture.
• Literary and early scientific prose (Robert Burton, Sir Thomas Browne).
• Diaries (Samuel Pepys, John Evelyn, Celia Fiennes etc.) .
• Early journalism (John Dunton).
• Poetry (the Elizabethan sonnet; the Metaphysical poets, especially John Donne and Andrew Marvell; Rochester); epic poetry (John Milton).
• Drama (Shakespeare; Congreve, Vanbrugh, Wycherley).
• The visual arts (especially: Wenceslas Hollar).

• Travel literature about India, encounters with Indian culture (Thomas Coryate).

The 18^th Century

• The rise of the private sphere in eighteenth-century London: material culture and middle-class mentalities. The private sphere and literature: the novel (Defoe, Fielding, Richardson, Cleland), the diary (Boswell), journalism (Addison and Steele; The Gentleman’s Magazine, The London Magazine), conduct books. The private sphere and the visual arts: conversation pieces; Hogarth’s Modern Moral Subjects.
• Gender roles, writing and publishing in eighteenth-century England (Montagu, Seward, Leapor / Pope, Gay, Swift, Smart).
• Eighteenth-century Edinburgh, its literary and cultural history. Robert Fergusson, Robert Burns, John Kay. Edinburgh as the Athens of the North. Scotland after 1746.
• Neo-classicism.
• Taste and the senses in the eighteenth century.
• The pre-history of English crime fiction: textual and visual narratives of crime
• Eighteenth-century music and musical aesthetics. Intermediality: text and music. George Frederic Handel’s oratorios. Ballad operas and cantatas. Exoticism, primitivism and the perception of Scottish music.
• Intermediality: text and image. Hogarth and Lichtenberg.

The 19^th Century

• Romanticism, tourism and travel literature.
• Romantic poetry: Byron, Heine, Pushkin.
• Anglo-German literary and cultural relations.
• History and literature: the historical novel. Scott.
• Crime fiction; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
• Science and literature: Charles Darwin and Lewis Carroll.
• Journalism and social criticism: Mayhew.
• Intermediality: authors and illustrators in the nineteenth century (Dickens / Cruickshank)
• Intermediality: text and music. Gilbert & Sullivan. Music hall and pantomime.

The 19^th and the 20^th Century

• German- and Yiddish-speaking emigrants and refugees in London, 1848-1945. Literatures of migration and exile. (Mayhew, Fontane, Zangwill, Kerr etc.) Identity and perceptions / depictions of urban space. Mental mapping and social topographies. Assimilation and cultural memory. Orientalism / urban exoticism: London as an oriental city.
• James Joyce. Modernism.
• Scottish crime fiction (Ian Rankin and others).
• Literature, culture and identity in post-devolution Scotland. The construction of a Scottish diaspora.

September 2019, Bamberg, Otto-Friedrich-Universität: “We see the trident of Neptune, the eagle of Jupiter, the Satyrs of Bacchus: Neo-Classicism and British Ideas of India.” LAPASEC Conference “Final Frontiers: Exploring, Discovering, Conquering in the Age of Enlightenment”.

July 2919, Edinburgh: “The Pastoral Bagpipe”: A Newly Invented Musical Instrument between Neo-Classicism and Highland Revival. (With practical demonstrations on a period instrument.)” 15^th International Congress on the Enlightenment.

June 2019, Essen: “Put the Kettle on! Tea, Coffee and Other Hot Drinks in British Cultural History.” Deutsch-Englische Gesellschaft Ruhr e.V.

June 2919, Hamburg, Universität Hamburg: “The Pastoral Pipes: A New Musical Instrument and the Aesthetics of Neo-Classicism”. Internationale Tagung “Music and the Arts in England, c. 1670-1750”.

May 2019, Essen, Universität Duisburg-Essen: “Der dunkle Fremde: Zur Kulturgeschichte des Kaffees im England des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts“ Vortragsreihe „Die Kleine Form“.

April 2019, Essen, Universität Duisburg-Essen: „Edinburgh as the Athens of the North: Architecture, Narratives of National Identity and International Networks of Neo-Classicism“, 1st Annual Conference „Interdisciplinary Perspectives of Global Cooperation Research), Käte Hamburger Kolleg.

March 2018, New Delhi, Jawaharlal Nehru University: „The Godfather of the Graphic Novel: William Hogarth´s Innovations in Print Culture and Eighteenth-Century English Society.” Invited paper, Conference: Media Studies: Paedagogic and Metholdological Engagements (Centre for Media Studies).

March 2018, New Delhi, Jawaharlal Nehru University: „A poore traveller and world seer: Thomas Coryate´s Voyage to India, 1612-1617”. Invited paper (English Department).

June 2017, Essen, Universität Duisburg-Essen:“A Walk on the Wild Side: John Gays Trivia, or the Art of Walking the Streets of London (1716).” (“Abwege – Fünf Dialoge”, with Prof. Jens Gurr).

June 2017, Essen, Universität Duisburg-Essen: “Zu Fuß nach Indien (1612-1617): Thomas Coryates abwegiges Abenteuer.“ (“Abwege – Fünf Dialoge”, with PD. Dr. Simone Loleit).

January 2017: Essen, Stadtbibliothek: “Gespräch über Bücher: Ian McEwans Saturday“.

February 2017, Essen, Deutsch-Englische Gesellschaft Ruhr e.V., „Almost unsufferable to our Ears? Romanticism and the Perception of the Highland Bagpipes, c. 1760-1830".

January 2017, Oxford, Annual Conference, British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies: “The Skeleton in the Phone Box: Gothic Imagination, Private Narrative and the Soane Family Monument.”

November 2016, Bamberg Graduate School of Literary, Culture and Media Studies, Georg-Friedrich-Universität, Bamberg: Master Class Workshop for Ph.D. Candidates: “The Great Fire of London (1666): A Case Study.”

November 2016, Bamberg Graduate School of Literary, Culture and Media Studies, Georg-Friedrich-Universität, Bamberg, invited paper: “Terrorist Attack or Divine Intervention? Making Sense of the Great Fire of London (1666)” (This paper was given in Frankfurt, Heidelberg and Bamberg to mark the tercentenary of the Great Fire of London.)

November 2016, Heidelberg, Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft, invited paper: “Terrorist Attack or Divine Intervention? Making Sense of the Great Fire of London (1666)”

October 2016, Frankfurt am Main, Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft/Britisches Honorarkonsulat, invited paper: “Terrorist Attack or Divine Intervention? Making Sense of the Great Fire of London (1666)”

July 2016, Ober-Ramstadt, Jahrestagung der Lichtenberg-Gesellschaft, invited paper: “Der Ort, wo Betteley und Ueberfluß in einer Secunde die Stelle wechseln: Glücksspiel in Hogarths London / Hogarths London als Glücksspiel“

June 2016, Essen, Mittwochsgesellschaft: “Horror oder Harmonie? Der schottische Dudelsack und die Musikästhetik der Romantik, ca. 1760-1830.“

February 2016, Munich, Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften (Junges Kolleg), workshop Present Pasts: Historical Consciousness and the Experience of Modernity. Invited paper: "Decline and Fall: Rome, London, Babylon".

January 2016, Essen, Stipendienfeier der Universität Duisburg-Essen, “Die Genese der modernen großstädtischen Identität: Architektur und Privatsphäre in London, ca. 1660-1800.“

January 2016, Oxford, Annual Conference, British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies: “The music of rude passion: Scottish Bagpipe Music and Eighteenth-Century Musical Aesthetics (with practical demonstrations).

July 2015: Essen, international conference Translated Memories: Trans­generational Perspectives in Literature on the Holocaust (Steinheim-Institut für Deutsch-Jüdische Geschichte): invited paper (with Richard Aronowitz, Oxford/London): “Translating Memory: Where Parallel Lines of Fact and Fiction Meet”.

March 2015: New Delhi (Jawaharlal Nehru University, School of Media Studies), invited paper: “A New Rome? The Ruins of London as a Tourist Attraction of the Future”.

March 2015: New Delhi (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Centre of English Studies), invited paper: “Bizarre Animals and British Literature”.

January 2015: Essen, Lebenslanges Lernen e.V. (Universität Duisburg-Essen). Invited paper: „Was heißt hier ‚gebildet‘?“

November 2014: Essen (Universität Duisburg-Essen). Series of lectures on Understanding and Mastering the Complex City (Ringvorlesung, Profilschwerpunkts „Urbane Systeme“): “From Pre-Modern to Modern Urban Complexity: The Case of London”.

October 2014: Sopot/Gdańsk, international conference on Place and Space in Scottish Literature and Culture. Keynote: "Between us and our Hame: Mock-Antiquarian Narratives of Space and Place in Tam o´Shanter." 

July 2014: London, „Literary London 2014: Ages of London“ (Literary London Society/Institute of English Studies, University of London): “Finer as a Ruin than in its Present State? Exploring the Future Ruins of London”

June 2014: Bremen (Universität Bremen). Invited paper (Konrektorin für Lehre und Studium / Konrektorin für Interkulturalität und Internationalität): „Was heißt hier ‚gebildet‘?“

June 2014: Strasbourg, interdisciplinary conference “Géographies des contacts. Contextes des rencontres entre les îles Britanniques et le Moyen-Orient“ (Université de Strasbourg). Invited paper: „Oriental Artefacts in English 17^th Century Cabinets of Curiosities: The Tradescant Collection.”

June 2014: Geneva, Conference on „The Senses of Modernity“ (Université de Genève). Keynote: „The Arts and Urban Modernity in the 18^th Century: The Case of William Hogarth.”

May 2014: Sopot/Gdańsk, Literary festival “Between/Pomiędzy“ and conference „New Beginnings in Scottish Literature“ (Uniwersytet Gdański). Keynote: „O’er Scotia’s parches lands the Naiads flew: Beginnings in Robert Fergusson’s The Rivers of Scotland (1773)” plus musical entertainment: Scottish music of the eighteenth century.

March 2014: Essen, „Universität im Spannungsfeld zwischen Wissen­schaftsfreiheit, religiöser Vielfalt und medialer Darstellung“ (Universität Duisburg-Essen): „Die Gegenstände der Geisteswissenschaften als Provokation. Konzept der Ringvorlesung Was heißt hier „gebildet“?“

June 2013: Jena (Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität). Invited paper: „Scottish Literature in the Romantic Era.“

April 2013: Essen, interdisciplinary series of lectures on Pleiten, Pech und Pannen: Zur Logik des Scheiterns in der Frühen Neuzeit. „A Miserable Sight: Der Großbrand von London (1666).“

April 2013: Essen (Mittwochsgesellschaft Ruhr). Invited paper: „London als Ruinenstadt der Zukunft.“

December 2012: Essen (Deutsch-Englische Gesellschaft Ruhr). Invited paper: „Barometz, Dodo, Jubjub, Heffalump! Bizarre Animals and British Literature: A Special Relationship.“

October 2012: Warsaw/Kasimierz Dolny, interdisciplinary conference Scotland in Europe (Uniwersytet Warszawski): „Scotland in Europe?“

June 2012: Frankfurt (Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft and Presse-Club Frankfurt). Invited paper: „Barometz, Dodo, Jubjub, Heffalump! Bizarre Animals and British Literature: A Special Relationship.”

April 2012: Los Angeles, interdisciplinary conference on Taste and the Senses in the Eighteenth Century (Center for 17^th and 18^th Century Studies, University of California at Los Angeles). Invited paper: „Handel’s Oratorios and the Taste of Eighteenth-Century London Audiences: Solomon as a Box Office Disaster.”

November 2011: Bamberg, interdisciplinary series of lectures: Animalia in Fabula (Universität Bamberg). Invited paper: „Tatu Arepa, Barometz, Jubjub, Heffalump: Vom Heimischwerden bizarrer Tiere in der Englischen Literatur.“

May 2011: Vancouver, interdisciplinary conference on The Elements: Air. (Humboldt Association of Canada, University of British Columbia.)  Keynote: “Grappling with the Intangible: A (Very) Short Cultural History of the Air.”

September 2010: Burg Schönburg, Celebrating Scot(t)s Voices (Universität Mainz), “The Decline and Fall of the Border Pipes: Material Culture, Cultural Practice and Notions of National Identity”.

September 2010: Saarbrücken, Anglistentag 2010, keynote: “The changes that have come over me: The Scottish Government Initiative Homecoming Scotland and Post-Devolution Perceptions of Scottish Literature, Culture and Identity.”

July 2010: Ober-Ramstadt, Jahrestagung der Lichtenberg-Gesellschaft: „Wenn die Menschen plötzlich tugendhaft würden, so müßten viele Tausende verhungern. Kriminaltiät in Hogarths London.“

January 2010: Berlin, Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft, Landesgruppe Berlin. Invited paper: “Almost insufferable to our Ears: Primitivism, Early Romanticism and the Perception of the Highland Bagpipes.”

December 2009: Regensburg. Gender and Creation in Early Modern England (Universität Regensburg). Invited paper: „Dame Nature’s Imagination. Creation, Creativity and Gender.“

November 2009: Göttingen, interdisciplinary conference: Darwin among the Disciplines (Georg August-Universität). Invited paper: “The Posthumous Evolution of the Dodo: From Charles Darwin to Lewis Carroll and Beyond.” This paper also requested as an invited paper at the following conference:

November 2009: Siegen, interdisciplinary conference: Darwin our Contemporary: Re-Imaginations and Medializations of Darwin and Cultures of Neo-Darwinian Ideas (Universität Siegen). Invited paper: “The Posthumous Evolution of the Dodo: From Charles Darwin to Lewis Carroll and Beyond.”

October 2009: Landau, 7^th LAPASEC Symposium on the Eighteenth Century (Universität Landau / Université Paris VI-Diderot): “Excursions into the Dubious Realms of Trivia and Cloacina.”

September 2009: Berlin, interdisciplinary conference: Discovering the Human: Life Sciences and the Arts in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Century (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin). Invited paper: “William Hogarth and Science”.

May 2009: Ottawa, interdisciplinary conference: The Elements: Fire (Humboldt Association of Canada / University of Ottawa). Keynote: “Perceptions of the Great Fire of London, 1666: Religious and Secular Constructions of a Disaster.”

May 2009: Geneva, Université de Genève. Invited paper: “Exotism, Primitivism and Eighteenth-Century Perceptions of Scottish Music.”

March 2009: London, Centre for Metropolitan History (School of Advanced Study, University of London). Invited paper: “German- and Yiddish-Speaking Immigrants in London: Experience and Literary Transformation.”

January 2009: Jena, Friedrich Schiller-Universität. Invited paper: „Romanticism, Post-Romanticism and English Travel Writing“.

November 2008: Darmstadt, Technische Universität Darmstadt. Invited paper: „Sherlock’s Home: London und die Entstehung des englischen Kriminalromans.“

October 2008: Paris, 6th LAPASEC Symposium on the Eighteenth Century (Université Paris-Diderot), “Horrid Howling or Sublime Sensation? Reactions to the Scottish Bagpipes and Eighteenth-Century Aesthetic Theory”.

October 2008: Edinburgh, workshop on Transnational Histories of the Book (British Academy and Centre for the History of the Book, University of Edinburgh): “Early Nineteenth-Century Travel Literature and its Impact on Early Tourism: A Case Study.”

September 2008: Berlin, interdisciplinary conference Urbs Incensa – ästhetische Transformationen der brennende Stadt (Max Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Florenz, and Historisches Seminar der Universität Luzern). Invited paper: „God´s Terrible Voice in the City: Anmerkungen zur literarischen Rezeption des Great Fire of London, 1666.“

September 2008: Berlin, International Summer School on Metropolitan Studies (Georg Simmel-Zentrum für Metropolenforschung, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin). Invited contribution: one-day workshop on „London as the Prototype of the Western Metropolis.“

September 2008: Frankfurt, Deutsch-Britische Gesellschaft Rhein-Main and Presse-Club Frankfurt. Invited paper: „London’s Tourist Attractions of the Future“.

August 2008: Bamberg, conference: Mediating Identities in Eighteenth-Century England (Otto-Friedrich-Universität), invited paper (response): “Space and Identity in Eighteenth-Century England”.

July 2008: Berlin, August Boekh Antike-Zentrum and Georg Simmel-Zentrum für Metropolenforschung (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin). Invited paper: „London – die Stadt und ihr antikes Erbe.“

Der dunkle Fremde: Zur Kulturgeschichte des Kaffees im England des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts

Vortrag in der Reihe „Die Kleine Form“, Sommersemester 2019.

Zu Fuß nach Indien (1612-1617) Thomas Coryats abwegiges Abenteuer und das Lob auf die Torheit

Vortrag gemeinsam mit Prof. Simone Loleit in der Reihe "Abwege - Fünf Dialoge", Sommersemester 2017.

A Walk on the Wild Side: John Gays Trivia, or the Art of Walking the Streets of London (1716).

Vortrag gemeinsam mit Prof. Jens Gurr in der Reihe “Abwege – Fünf Dialoge”, Sommersemester 2017.

Study tour to Edinburgh, September 2017: The Athens of the North

Exkursion nach Edinburgh mit einer Gruppe von 18 Studierenden im Jahr 2017.

Musik der Band "R12 R04"

Gemeinsames Musizieren der Band "R12 R04", bestehend aus Christoph Heyl, Frank Erik Pointner, Michaela Meyer und Alan Webb bei der Verabschiedung von Alan Webb.

Academic Writing: A Very Brief Introduction

All students thinking about writing a seminar paper, a BA thesis or an MA thesis are encouraged to watch this short refresher course on academic writing. Click here for the video (MP4, 852 MB). Style sheets for footnote style as well as MLA style can be found here and here.