Contested Selves : Life Writing and German Culture

Katja Herges

ISBN 10: 1640141057 / ISBN 13: 9781640141056

Published by Camden House, 2021

About this Item

nach der Bestellung gedruckt Neuware - Printed after ordering - In recent decades, life writing has exploded in popularity: memoirs that focus on traumatic experiences now constitute the largest growth sector in book publishing worldwide. But life writing is not only highly marketable; it also does important emotional, cultural, and political work. It is more available to amateurs and those without the cultural capital or the self-confidence to embrace more traditional literary forms, and thus gives voice to marginalized populations. Contested Selves investigates various forms of German-language life writing, including memoirs, interviews, letters, diaries, and graphic novels, shedding light on its democratic potential, on its ability to personalize history and historicize the personal. The contributors ask how the various authors construct and negotiate notions of the self relative to socio political contexts, cultural traditions, genre expectations, and narrative norms. They also investigate the nexus of writing, memory, and experience, including the genre's truth claims vis-à-vis the pliability and unreliability of human memories. Finally, they explore ethical questions that arise from intimate life writing and from the representation of 'vulnerable subjects' as well as from the interrelation of material body, embodied self, and narrative. All forms of life writing discussed in this volume are invested in a process of making meaning and in an exchange of experience that allows us to relate our lives to the lives of others.KATJA HERGES is a physician and researcher in Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy at the University of Tübingen. ELISABETH KRIMMER is Professor of German at the University of California, Davis.

Seller Inventory # 9781640141056

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Contested Selves : Life Writing and German Culture
• Publisher: Camden House
• Publication Date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1640141057
• ISBN 13: 9781640141056
• Binding: Buch
• Condition: Neu
• Dimensions: 235W x 157H x 22D millimeters 235 millimeters width by 157 millimeters height by 22 millimeters depth
• Weight: 622 grams

About this title

Synopsis

Investigates the field of German life writing, from Rahel Levin Varnhagen around 1800 to Carmen Sylva a century later, from Döblin, Becher, women's WWII diaries, German-Jewish memoirs, and East German women's interview literatureto the autofiction of Lena Gorelik.



In recent decades, life writing has exploded in popularity: memoirs that focus on traumatic experiences now constitute the largest growth sector in book publishing worldwide. But life writing is not only highly marketable; it also does important emotional, cultural, and political work. It is more available to amateurs and those without the cultural capital or the self-confidence to embrace more traditional literary forms, and thus gives voice to marginalized populations. Contested Selves investigates various forms of German-language life writing, including memoirs, interviews, letters, diaries, and graphic novels, shedding light on its democratic potential, on its ability to personalize history and historicize the personal. The contributors ask how the various authors construct and negotiate notions of the self relative to sociopolitical contexts, cultural traditions, genre expectations, and narrative norms. They also investigate the nexus of writing, memory, and experience, including the genre's truth claims vis-à-vis the pliability and unreliability of human memories. Finally, they explore ethical questions that arise from intimate life writing and from the representation of "vulnerable subjects" as well as from the interrelation of material body, embodied self, and narrative. All forms of life writing discussed in this volume are invested in a process of making meaning and in an exchange of experience that allows us to relate our lives to the lives of others.

About the Authors

KATJA HERGES is a physician and holds a PhD in German from the University of California, Davis.

ELISABETH KRIMMER is Professor of German at the University of California, Davis.

LAURA DEIULIO is Associate Professor of German at Christopher Newport University, VA.

KATRA A. BYRAM is Associate Professor of German at Ohio State University.

MAUREEN BURDOCK is a graphic storyteller, writer, and illustrator with dual master's degrees from the California School of the Arts and a PhD in Cultural Studies from the University of California, Davis.