Current PhD Research
Judith Jansma | From Submission to Soumission: Populist Perspectives on Culture
Judith Jansma | University of Groningen
In today’s political discourse the idea of a culturally-grounded national identity has made a strong come-back. One can think of Theresa May’s (in)famous statement that “citizens of the world are actually citizens of nowhere”, or Dutch Christian-democratic party CDA insisting on the integration of the national hymn in the primary school curriculum. Yet this adherence to national identity as a way to deal with complex societal challenges (globalization, multiculturalism) is performed to a much greater extent by populist parties associated with the far right. Their understanding of citizenship being based on the notion of “ethnos” rather than “demos” – leading to a strong “us vs. them” narrative – it should not come as a surprise that culture is an important tool to unite “us” and to exclude “them”.
Marloes Mekenkamp | Violence and Affect in Female Poetic Activism in Contemporary Mexico
Marloes Mekenkamp | Radboud University
Contemporary Mexican cultural production is strongly influenced by the extreme violence that has engulfed the country in recent years. A literary phenomenon that emerged within this context is the production of political poetry written by women that combines commemoration with mobilization. This form of poetic activism recounts violent episodes of Mexico’s recent past by appropriating testimonies by victims. In addition, these poems are remediated in the public sphere, during protest marches and performances that seek to denounce violent acts committed by the state and/or criminal groups and demand justice and peace.
Elizabeth Pinilla Duarte | Twittering for Peace? The construction of meaning and Otherness in digital media representations of the Colombian Peace Process
Elizabeth Pinilla Duarte | University of Groningen
My research project studies the production of narratives of the Colombian peace process in Colombian digital media, both in official communication and in the comments left by consumers of news on the Facebook, Twitter and Instagram websites.
Lamyk Bekius | Genetic Criticism applied to born-digital works of literature
Lamyk Bekius | Huygens ING (KNAW) and University of Antwerp
Up until now, literary scholars working in textual scholarship studied the genetics of literary texts that where produced using analogue methods. However, contemporary literature is produced within an environment where digital methods dominate; the NWO-funded project Track Changes: Textual Scholarship and the Challenge of Digital Literary Writing therefore investigates if and how this medium change affects the creative process of literary writing.
Floor Buschenhenke | The creative writing process in the digital age
Floor Buschenhenke | Huygens ING (KNAW)
This research is part of an NWO-funded project, Track Changes: Textual Scholarship and the Challenge of Digital Literary Writing, in which we investigate the consequences of the digital work process for research methods into textual genetics. The
Sophie, Hsin-lin Su | Paths with/out Us: Three Case Studies of Environmental Changes and Environmental Aestheticism in Taiwanese Literature
Sophie, Hsin-lin Su | Utrecht University
This project draws on and positions itself partially within the field of ecocriticism to examine three case studies involving aesthetic representations of environmental changes in Taiwanese literature and culture: representations of butterflies, flying fish, and nuclear radiation in the region of the Pacific Ocean.
Andrés Ibarra Cordero | Space and Time of Queer Masculinities in Contemporary Fiction
Andrés Ibarra Cordero | University of Amsterdam
This research examines representations of space and time in contemporary English and Spanish fiction by writers who have explored the construction of queer/gay male identities at the turn of the twentieth century.
OSL Awards 2018
Each year, OSL rewards two of its members with an OSL Award for the publication of an excellent scholarly book and article. The Awards are intended to acknowledge original and innovative contributions to the field of literary studies and to highlight the work of talented scholars at the beginning of their careers. The OSL Awards come with prize money of € 500,- for each award.
Jesse van Amelsvoort – Minorities, Migration, Mediation: Expressing Sense of Belonging in Multilingual Europe
Jesse van Amelsvoort | Minorities, Migration, Mediation: Expressing Sense of Belonging in Multilingual Europe | University of Groningen – Campus Fryslân | Supervisors: prof. dr. Goffe Jensma, prof. dr Margriet van der Waal, dr Matt Coler | September 2017 – August 2021 This research project investigates the role multilingual minority writers can play in processes of […]
Roel Smeets – Character Networks in Contemporary Dutch Literature
Roel Smeets | Character Networks in Contemporary Dutch Literature | Radboud University Nijmegen, Department of Literary and Cultural Studies | Supervisors: prof. dr Maarten de Pourcq, prof. dr. Antal van den Bosch | September 2016 – September 2020 In the last decade or so, the rise of Digital Humanities has made it possible to implement […]