Current Objectives of Postgraduate American Studies (COPAS - E-Journal)
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"Timeless People": The Development of the Ancestral Figure in Three Novels by Alice Walker
No full textThe concept of the ancestral figure is one of the important aspects of African American literature. The paper traces the development of the concept in three novels by Alice Walker, concentrating mainly on the imagery Walker employs for the personification of the ancestral
Dystopia, Alternate History and the Posthuman in Bioshock
No full textIn dystopian visions articulated at the beginning of the twenty-first century, one can observe a tendency to approach biotechnology as implicating the threat of posthumanity. Different media explore such perspectives on the future and it is the goal of my paper to analyze the specific perspective that informs the medium of video games. I propose to read the game Bioshock “from a dialectic of video games studies and literary studies, focusing on its uses of simulation and agency, its appropriation of alternate history and dystopia, and its treatment of a posthuman society
Reflexivity and (Ex-)Change: New Perspectives from the Postgraduate Forum for German Americanists
No full textWriting Jazz History: The Emergence of a New Genre
No full textWhile very early jazz criticism was often limited to the form of journal articles, music critics in the 1930s started to publish longer books on the music and—as I will argue in my paper—created a new genre: the jazz history
Building a Better Place: Utopianism and the Revision of Community in Toni Morrison’s Paradise
No full textThis article examines the role of utopianism in Toni Morrison’s 1997 novel Paradise“. It argues that, by juxtaposing the all-black town of Ruby with a group of women living in a nearby convent, Morrison revises traditional views of what constitutes the best type of community. She criticizes the idea of utopian perfection predicated on purity and exclusion and envisions an alternative community characterized by ongoing negotiation. Rejecting all utopian master narratives, Morrison projects a better place at a more human scale
Transatlantic Miscommunication in David Hare’s Drama Stuff Happens“
Get PDFThis article addresses the transatlantic relations between the United States and Europe and specifically Great Britain in the context of post-9/11 international politics as reflected in the drama Stuff Happens“ (2004) written by British playwright David Hare. It focuses on the way re­cent history is performed and contextualized in dramatic form and analyzes the function and power of the theatricalization“ of historic events and particularly of finding ways to address 9/11 on a stage. Furthermore, it discusses the method of mixing parts of public speeches quoted ver­batim with fiction and its effects on readers and audiences. The play addresses the struggles and fragility of international diplomacy in the aftermath of 9/11. It reflects a general skepticism to­wards politicians and their decisions as well as the helpless position of millions of observers who are affected by these decisions and yet feel like they have no influence. This article sees post-9/11 verbatim theater as a chance for playwright and spectators to get access to the world of politics and to take part in the process of writing transatlantic history. More generally, through the ex­ample of this play, the article aims at discussing new challenges and functions of post-9/11 theater
The U.S. Filibusters in Transnational Newspaper Discourses, 1855-1857
Get PDFThe essay focuses on the transnational entanglements between the USA and Nicaragua in the mid-nineteenth century, when U.S. adventurers (so-called ‘filibusters’) started private invasions to the American isthmus. One embodiment of these entanglements was El Nicaraguense“, a bilingual newspaper published by the invaders and distributed in the USA and Central America. The article analyzes how the paper contributed to the incorporation of Nicaragua into the U.S. colonial realm
From Opposition to Integration: Stages in the Development of the "New Woman" in Selected Provincetown Plays
No full textThis essay argues that the nineteenth-century philosophy of bi-polarity, as manifest first and foremost in the concept of separate spheres, is still largely unaltered in the short plays of Susan Glaspell, Neith Boyce and Rita Wellman, the three most prolific female playwrights among the Provincetown Players. The plays analyzed in this paper include Glaspell\u27s "Trifles" (1916), "The Outside" (1917), and her short comedy "A Woman\u27s Honor" (1918), Wellman\u27s "Funiculi Funicula" (1917)¹ and Boyce\u27s "Constancy" (1915), "The Two Sons" (1916), and "Enemies" (1915), the latter of which Boyce co-authored with her husband. Although the artistic merit of these short plays has often been challenged, they deserve recognition as important literary, cultural and social documents that reflect sincere attempts to fuse theatrical originality with social concerns. The cultural and social aspect in focus here is the New Woman. In spite of depicting more or less successful representatives of the New Woman, the worlds presented on stage are marked by the established polar categories. Although displaying the ambitions of the New Woman, the female characters are trapped in polarized worlds. 1. Wellman\u27s short play "Funiculi Funicula" is one of the very few Provincetown plays to have won some critical appraisal; Barlow regards it as "one of the most disturbing if not best written plays of the group." (Barlow 1995:281). 
"The Pleasure Is All Mine": Music and Female Sexual Autonomy
Get PDFTo analyze sexual autonomy this paper concentrates on the recent concept of relational autonomy, which is different from the classic tradition in its multilevel perspective on persons as embodied, desiring, creative as well as rational creatures. I then apply this concept to music asking in which way women performers are both relational and (sexually) autonomous
Narrative Strategien in der TV-Serie Desperate Housewives
No full textThe TV-series Desperate Housewives is desperately loved by fans and desperately hated by critics. American columnist Jennifer L. Pozner accuses the series of portraying every female character as incompetent, in her opinion that is "just good old fashioned Hollywood crap." But why is this "Hollywood crap" so astonishingly successful (25 million viewers in the US, 3 million viewers in Germany) and who is the typical viewer? Why is the (dead) narrator so important and does the TV-Series really reinforce old-fashioned stereotypes or does it present modern, independent housewives? These questions are the main focus of this essay and shall be answered by analyzing typical visual and narrative strategies of the series.