Claudia Benthien - Böcker

"Only skin deep," "getting under one's skin," "the naked truth": metaphors about the skin pervade the language even as physical embellishments and alterations-tattoos, piercings, skin-lifts, liposuction, tanning, and more-proliferate in Western culture. Yet outside dermatology textbooks, the topic of skin has been largely ignored. This important cultural study shows how our perception of skin has changed from the eighteenth century to the present. Claudia Benthien argues that despite medicine's having penetrated the bodily surface and exposed the interior of the body as never before, skin, paradoxically, has become a more and more unyielding symbol. She examines the changing significance of skin through brilliant analyses of literature, art, philosophy, and anatomical drawings and writings. Benthien discusses the semantic and psychic aspects of touching, feeling, and intellectual perception; the motifs of perforated, armored, or transparent skin; the phantasma of flaying; and much more through close readings of such authors as Kleist, Hawthorne, Balzac, Rilke, Kafka, Plath, Morrison, Wideman, and Ondaatje.Myriad images from the Renaissance, anatomy books, and contemporary visual and performance art enhance the text.

"Only skin deep," "getting under one's skin," "the naked truth": metaphors about the skin pervade the language even as physical embellishments and alterations-tattoos, piercings, skin-lifts, liposuction, tanning, and more-proliferate in Western culture. Yet outside dermatology textbooks, the topic of skin has been largely ignored. This important cultural study shows how our perception of skin has changed from the eighteenth century to the present. Claudia Benthien argues that despite medicine's having penetrated the bodily surface and exposed the interior of the body as never before, skin, paradoxically, has become a more and more unyielding symbol. She examines the changing significance of skin through brilliant analyses of literature, art, philosophy, and anatomical drawings and writings. Benthien discusses the semantic and psychic aspects of touching, feeling, and intellectual perception; the motifs of perforated, armored, or transparent skin; the phantasma of flaying; and much more through close readings of such authors as Kleist, Hawthorne, Balzac, Rilke, Kafka, Plath, Morrison, Wideman, and Ondaatje.Myriad images from the Renaissance, anatomy books, and contemporary visual and performance art enhance the text.

The beginning of the 20th century saw literary scholars from Russia positing a new definition for the nature of literature. Within the framework of Russian Formalism, the term ‘literariness’ was coined. The driving force behind this theoretical inquiry was the desire to identify literature—and art in general—as a way of revitalizing human perception, which had been numbed by the automatization of everyday life. The transformative power of ‘literariness’ is made manifest in many media artworks by renowned artists such as Chantal Akerman, Mona Hatoum, Gary Hill, Jenny Holzer, William Kentridge, Nalini Malani, Bruce Nauman, Martha Rosler, and Lawrence Weiner. The authors use literariness as a tool to analyze the aesthetics of spoken or written language within experimental film, video performance, moving image installations, and other media-based art forms. This volume uses as its foundation the Russian Formalist school of literary theory, with the goal of extending these theories to include contemporary concepts in film and media studies, such as Neoformalism, intermediality, remediation, and postdrama.

The beginning of the 20th century saw literary scholars from Russia positing a new definition for the nature of literature. Within the framework of Russian Formalism, the term ‘literariness’ was coined. The driving force behind this theoretical inquiry was the desire to identify literature—and art in general—as a way of revitalizing human perception, which had been numbed by the automatization of everyday life. The transformative power of ‘literariness’ is made manifest in many media artworks by renowned artists such as Chantal Akerman, Mona Hatoum, Gary Hill, Jenny Holzer, William Kentridge, Nalini Malani, Bruce Nauman, Martha Rosler, and Lawrence Weiner. The authors use literariness as a tool to analyze the aesthetics of spoken or written language within experimental film, video performance, moving image installations, and other media-based art forms. This volume uses as its foundation the Russian Formalist school of literary theory, with the goal of extending these theories to include contemporary concepts in film and media studies, such as Neoformalism, intermediality, remediation, and postdrama.

Gegenwärtig lässt sich in unterschiedlichen gesellschaftlichen Diskursfeldern eine Bezugnahme auf das Motiv der ‚Vanitas‘ (Vergänglichkeit) feststellen.Die Beiträge dieses Band widmen sich der überraschenden Virulenz eines ursprünglich christlichen und in der Frühen Neuzeit wirkmächtigen Konzeptes in Popkultur, Literatur, Musik und bildender Kunst und verdeutlichen ferner seine Relevanz für Soziologie, Theologie, Philosophie, Psychologie und Medizin. Bedeutung erlangt Vanitas sowohl mit traditionell dem Motiv verwandten Themen wie Trauer und Mortalität als auch in Verbindung mit hochaktuellen Diskursen über Beschleunigungs- und Kontingenzerfahrungen, dystopischen Szenarien der Klimakatastrophe oder utopischen Visionen des Transhumanismus. Neben soziologischen und kulturwissenschaftlichen Perspektiven auf Vergänglichkeit, Flüchtigkeit, letale Krankheiten, Alter und Tod widmen sich die Beiträge der popkulturellen und künstlerischen Aneignung des Vanitas-Topos zwischen spielerischer Ironie und tiefsinniger Melancholie.Der interdisziplinäre Band ist ein wichtiger Beitrag zur gesellschaftlichen und kulturellen Reflexion von Gegenwart unter Bezugnahme auf einen tradierten kulturtheoretischen Topos.

Die interdisziplinäre Studie untersucht Lyrik, die in städtischen Räumen zu sehen oder zu hören ist. Aus literaturwissenschaftlicher Perspektive interessieren vor allem die Ästhetik, Sprachgestaltung und Ortsbezüglichkeit der präsentierten Lyrik, aus stadtsoziologischer Sicht die Einbindung der Projekte in stadtpolitische Konstellationen, Debatten über öffentliche Räume und ihr Beitrag zur Produktion des jeweiligen Raums. Das Spektrum der analysierten Lyrikprojekte ist vielfältig. Es reicht von Wandgedichten an Hausfassaden und Audiowalks in Stadtvierteln über Gedichte auf Lesezeichen, die vom Hubschrauber auf öffentliche Plätze abgeworfen werden, oder großformatige Projektionen an repräsentative Gebäude einer Stadt bis zu informellen, durch Dichter:innen oder Anwohner:innen initiierte Formen, etwa Gedichte auf kopierten Zetteln, die in Parks oder U-Bahnen aufgehängt werden und derart ihr „Recht auf Stadt" (Henri Lefebvre) beanspruchen. Lyrikprojekte in urbanen Räumen wurden bisher nicht untersucht. Die Studie schließt nicht nur dieses Desiderat der Lyrikforschung, sondern bietet durch den interdisziplinären Ansatz kreative Interpretationen von Gedichten in städtischen Kontexten, die für ein breites Lesepublikum interessant sind.

As a multifaceted and intermedial phenomenon, poetry in the digital age not only demands a rethinking and expansion of the traditional paradigms of literary studies but also attracts increasing attention from other humanities. This interdisciplinary handbook is thus addressed both to literary scholars and to the broadest academic audience interested in contemporary poetry research. It offers 50 contributions by an international collective of authors that highlight the diversity of contemporary poetry, examining it from a wide variety of complementing theoretical and methodological angles. The handbook focuses on contemporary modes of poetry presentation that are often located beyond the book, e.g., on stages, in public spaces, as multi- as well as transmedia publications, or on digital platforms. Such intermedial poetic practices, which may supplement poetic language with elements borrowed from music, visual art, cinema, or theater and performance, are transforming the forms and functions of poetry. It four parts thus (1) adapt established concepts and parameters of poetry research to the digital age, (2) explore established genres and emerging formats, (3) introduce interdisciplinary perspectives and new research fields, and (4) engage in current debates.

Wenn jede Begrenzung bereits ihre Entgrenzung enthält, welche ästhetischen und erkenntnistheoretischen Phänomene entstehen dann im Spannungsverhältnis zwischen Grenzziehung und Grenzüberschreitung?