Boundaries Unbound: Gains and Losses

Keynote bei der Women in German Studies Open Conference 2024: Boundaries and Barriers: Interrogating Ideas and Practices of Demarcation in German Studies am University College Cork, 4.–6.7.2024

Beginning with a reflection on the current state of our profession when viewed from the perspective of borders, barriers and boundaries, the contribution compares and contrasts the border-paradigm with alternative models (such as ecology, symbiosis or entangled history, for example) which seek to displace and, ideally, replace the logic of borders. After exploring their respective similarities and differences as well as their advantages and disadvantages, I will try argue for important limits to the dissolution of boundaries.

Die Literaturwissenschaftlerin Eva Geulen ist die Direktorin des ZfL, Vorstandsmitglied der Geisteswissenschaftlichen Zentren Berlin und Professorin für europäische Kultur- und Wissensgeschichte am Institut für Kulturwissenschaft der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.