A life worthy of living: Kolmar's Susanna

This talk is part of a series focusing on Dis/Ability Studies both within and beyond German Studies, organized by Professor Michael Boehringer as part of his Disability in German Literature course and sponsored by Waterloo Centre for German Studens.

On Thursday, March 17, 2022 (1:00 -2:20 pm EST) Dr. Alec Cattell (Texas Tech University) will discuss "A life worthy of living: Kolmar's Susanna."

Talk Description: Join Dr. Alec Cattell (Texas Tech University) for an interactive virtual discussion about Gertrud Kolmar's last surviving literary work, the novella Susanna. After exploring the social and political context in which Susanna was written, the conversation will turn to Kolmar's mode of representing the protagonist as a person with a disability as well as the ways in which she negotiates disability myths and deploys disability rhetorics to inspire readers to read stories about disability ethically.

Bio: Dr. Alec Cattell serves as Associate Director of the Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center and Director of the Ethics in Teaching & Learning program. He also teaches German language and cultures, literature, and world cinema in the Department of Classical & Modern Languages & Literatures. Alec holds a Ph.D. in German from the University of Waterloo, where he also studied applied linguistics and earned the Certificate in University Teaching at the Centre for Teaching Excellence. He has published scholarly work on representations, aesthetics, and rhetorics of disability in German literature as well as curriculum design and technology in language pedagogy. His current research investigates the use of digital storytelling to shift narratives about (cultural) identity while fostering multiple literacies.

All talks are free and open to the public and will be hosted on Zoom. If you would like to learn about the other talks in the series please visit the WCGS website.

Please register for each event separately.