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“How We Read: Towards An Ecological Philology.”

Deutsches Haus at NYU presents a lecture by Hanjo Berressem, Professor of American Literature and Culture at the University of Cologne, and DAAD Visiting Scholar at Deutsches Haus at NYU in September and October on “How We Read: Towards An Ecological Philology.”

About the talk:

How do we read within today’s complex and diverse media ecology? What are the practices and the milieus of ‘reading now’? To contour these problematics, the talk revisits Roland Barthes’ notions of the ‘readerly’ and the ‘writerly’ text, as well as John Fiske’s subsequent notion of the ‘producerly’ which transposes Barthes’ notions from the page to the TV screen. Using examples taken from the work of Mark Z. Danielewski and Leanne Shapton, the talk argues for a theory of reading that treats every ‘reading scene’ [Leseszene] as inherently time- and site-specific, and that recalibrates two philological registers: the intensity of reading a text and the attempt to make sense of a text.

About the speaker:

Hanjo Berressem studied English Literature and Art History at the University of Aachen. During his studies, he received DAAD scholarships to spend a year at the University of Michigan and a year at Brown University. After finishing his Ph. D. thesis on the work of Thomas Pynchon in 1989, he began work on his Habilitation, which was funded by a DFG research grant. In 1994, he spent a year at the University of Berkeley. After finishing his Habilitation in 1996, he taught American Literature and Culture at the Universities of Bielefeld (1996–1998), Hannover (1998–2000), and Cologne, where he is currently teaching. In 2002, he was ‘Visiting Scholar’ at the University of California (UCLA). He is Speaker of the Zentrum für Medienwissenschaften and a member of the a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School at the University of Cologne. His academic interests include contemporary American fiction (in particular the work of Thomas Pynchon, William Gibson, and Bret Easton Ellis), Media Studies, as well as the work of Michel Serres and Gilles Deleuze. A two-studies-in-one book Eigenvalue: On the Gradual Contraction of Media in Movement and Eigenvalue: Contemplating Media in Art [Sound|Image|Sense] has been published by Bloomsbury Press in a back-to-back (tête-bêche) format this year. Two further books, Félix Guattari’s Schizoanalytic Ecology  and Gilles Deleuze’s Luminous Philosophy, will be published by Edinburgh University Press in 2019. Professor Berressem will be a DAAD Visiting Scholar at Deutsches Haus at NYU in September and October.

Attendance information

Events at Deutsches Haus are free of charge. If you would like to attend this event, please send us an email to [email protected]. Space at Deutsches Haus is limited, please arrive ten minutes prior to the event. Thank you!

“How We Read: Towards an Ecological Philology” is a DAAD-sponsored event.











When: Mon., Oct. 15, 2018 at 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Where: Deutsches Haus at NYU
42 Washington Mews
212-998-8660
Price: Free
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Deutsches Haus at NYU presents a lecture by Hanjo Berressem, Professor of American Literature and Culture at the University of Cologne, and DAAD Visiting Scholar at Deutsches Haus at NYU in September and October on “How We Read: Towards An Ecological Philology.”

About the talk:

How do we read within today’s complex and diverse media ecology? What are the practices and the milieus of ‘reading now’? To contour these problematics, the talk revisits Roland Barthes’ notions of the ‘readerly’ and the ‘writerly’ text, as well as John Fiske’s subsequent notion of the ‘producerly’ which transposes Barthes’ notions from the page to the TV screen. Using examples taken from the work of Mark Z. Danielewski and Leanne Shapton, the talk argues for a theory of reading that treats every ‘reading scene’ [Leseszene] as inherently time- and site-specific, and that recalibrates two philological registers: the intensity of reading a text and the attempt to make sense of a text.

About the speaker:

Hanjo Berressem studied English Literature and Art History at the University of Aachen. During his studies, he received DAAD scholarships to spend a year at the University of Michigan and a year at Brown University. After finishing his Ph. D. thesis on the work of Thomas Pynchon in 1989, he began work on his Habilitation, which was funded by a DFG research grant. In 1994, he spent a year at the University of Berkeley. After finishing his Habilitation in 1996, he taught American Literature and Culture at the Universities of Bielefeld (1996–1998), Hannover (1998–2000), and Cologne, where he is currently teaching. In 2002, he was ‘Visiting Scholar’ at the University of California (UCLA). He is Speaker of the Zentrum für Medienwissenschaften and a member of the a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School at the University of Cologne. His academic interests include contemporary American fiction (in particular the work of Thomas Pynchon, William Gibson, and Bret Easton Ellis), Media Studies, as well as the work of Michel Serres and Gilles Deleuze. A two-studies-in-one book Eigenvalue: On the Gradual Contraction of Media in Movement and Eigenvalue: Contemplating Media in Art [Sound|Image|Sense] has been published by Bloomsbury Press in a back-to-back (tête-bêche) format this year. Two further books, Félix Guattari’s Schizoanalytic Ecology  and Gilles Deleuze’s Luminous Philosophy, will be published by Edinburgh University Press in 2019. Professor Berressem will be a DAAD Visiting Scholar at Deutsches Haus at NYU in September and October.

Attendance information

Events at Deutsches Haus are free of charge. If you would like to attend this event, please send us an email to [email protected]. Space at Deutsches Haus is limited, please arrive ten minutes prior to the event. Thank you!

“How We Read: Towards an Ecological Philology” is a DAAD-sponsored event.

Buy tickets/get more info now