Conference The Institution of Literature: 250 Years of English Studies and Cultural Transfer

The Institution of Literature: 250 Years of English Studies and Cultural Transfer

from Thursday, August 30 to Saturday, September 1, 2012.

2012 marks the 250^th anniversary of the election of John Tompson as the first Professor of English at Goettingen University. His English Miscellanies was one of the first English publications ever in Germany, and was also the first anthology composed in an academic context for the purpose of the mediation of English literature and culture to German students of English. The Miscellanies was therefore an important watershed in the development of British-German literary and cultural transfer.

The department of British Literature and Culture and the department of English Didactics will celebrate this important anniversary with a jointly organised conference. Keynote speakers will be Susan Bassnett, Terry Eagleton, and Konrad Schröder.

A wide range of national and international scholars will present papers on

• the historical and political imperatives that have informed the mediation of British literature and culture;
• the role and the history of the anthology as a genre of its own;
• questions of canon formation in the context of the mediation of national literature and culture;
• literary translation and the translation industry as factors in cultural transfer processes;
• cultural exchange, reciprocal transfers, and networks of knowledge and ideas;
• the relationship between literature and culture in teaching contexts and questions of methodology;cultural exchange, reciprocal transfers, and networks of knowledge and ideas;
• the role of literature in language teacher education;
• the problem of disciplinary origins of the teaching of English;
• the relationship between literature and language teaching;
• teaching English in the age of globalisation.

The conference is open to an interested public. The conference fee will be 50 Euro, payable on registration.
Graduate and undergraduate students are particulary welcome and free of charge. If you would like to participate, please register via email.