Education
2014 _____ PhD, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin. “Biopunk Dystopias: Genetic Engineering, Society and Science Fiction
2010 _____ Master of Higher Education, Universität Hamburg
2005 _____ Magister Artium American Studies, British Studies, German Studies, Universität Hamburg Publications
Books
2016 Biopunk Dystopias: Genetic Engineering, Society and Science Fiction. Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2016.
2008 Discredited Knowledge: Magie, Mythos und Toni Morrisons Song of Solomon. Saarbrücken: AV, 2008.
Edited Volumes
2012 Collision of Realities: Establishing Research on the Fantastic in Europe. Ed. with Astrid Böger. Berlin: DeGruyter, 2012.
2012 Fremde Welten: Wege und Räume der Fantastik im 21. Jahrhundert. Ed. with Hans-Harald Müller. Berlin: DeGruyter, 2012.
2011 Wahnsinn in der Kunst: Kulturelle Imaginationen vom Mittelalter bis zum 21. Jahrhundert. Ed. with Susanne Rohr. Trier: WVT, 2011.
Journal Articles (Peer-Reviewed)
2016 “How Bilbo Lost his Innocence: Media Audiences and the Evaluation of The Hobbit as a Children’s Film” Participations: Journal of Audience and Reception Studies 13.2 (2016).
2016 “‘Scavenge, Slay, Survive’: The Zombie Apocalypse, Exploration, and Lived Experience in DayZ.” Special Issue: Digital SF. Science Fiction Studies 43.1 (2016). 67-84.
2015 “Frankenstein’s Offspring: Practicing Science and Parenthood in Natali’s Splice“. Science Fiction Film and Television 8.3 (2015): 343-69.
2011 “Frankenstein und das posthumane Monster: Vincenzo Natalis Splice.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 2.1 (2011): 108-15.
2004 “Hypnos und Thanatos: Das Bild des Todes in Robert Schneiders Schlafes Bruder.” Modern Austrian Literature 37.3/4 (2004): 47-64.
Journal Articles (Editor-Reviewed)
2014 “Biopunk 101.” SFRA Review 309 (2014): 31-36.
2011 “Video Game Studies 101.” SFRA Review 298 (2011): 9-16.
2010 “Hybride Texte: Genretransgression in Niffeneggers The Time Traveler’s Wife und Gibsons Pattern Recognition.” Quarber Merkur: Literaturzeitschrift für Science Fiction und Phantastik 111 (2010): 111-34.
2008 “‘Commodification will soon follow identification’: Wechselwirkungen von Kunst und Kommerz in William Gibsons Pattern Recognition und Trent Reznors Year Zero.” Literatur in Wissenschaft und Unterricht (LWU) 4.41 (2008): 237-55.
Book Chapters
2016 “Labyrinthine Challenges and Degenerate Strategies in The Hunger Games.” Critical Insights: The Hunger Games Trilogy. Ed. Lana Whited. Amenia: Grey House, 2016. 224-38.
2015 “Cyberpunk and Dystopia: William Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984)”. Dystopia, Science Fiction, Post-Apocalypse: Classics – New Tendencies – Model Interpretations. Ed. Eckart Voigts und Alessandra Boller. Trier: WVT, 2015: 221-36.
2014 “Modern-Day Superheroes: Transgressions of Genre and Morality in Misfits.” w/ Dana Frei. Transitions and Dissolving Boundaries in the Fantastic. Ed. Christine Lötscher et al. Münster: LIT, 2014. 99-124.
2013 “Konventionen und Innovationen am Beispiel des Genres ‘Science Fiction.'” Innovation – Konvention: Transdisziplinäre Beiträge zu einem kulturellen Spannungsfeld. Ed. Dennis Büscher-Ulbrich, Stefanie Kadenbach and Martin Kindermann. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2013. 295-324.
2011 “Mythos und ‘Madness’: Der Wissenschaftler in Shelleys Frankenstein und Atwoods Oryx and Crake.” Wahnsinn in der Kunst: Kulturelle Imaginationen vom Mittelalter bis zum 21. Jahrhundert. Ed. Susanne Rohr and Lars Schmeink. Trier: WVT, 2011. 225-50.
2011 “Einführung: Wahnsinn in der Kunst.” w/ Susanne Rohr. Wahnsinn in der Kunst: Kulturelle Imaginationen vom Mittelalter bis zum 21. Jahrhundert. Ed. Susanne Rohr and Lars Schmeink. Trier: WVT, 2011. 1-7.
2009 “Rätselhafte Kunst: Zum Verhältnis von Kreativität, Konsum und Autorschaft im 21. Jahrhundert.” Post-Coca-Colanization: Zurück zur Vielfalt? Ed. Sophia Komor and Rebekka Rohleder. Frankfurt/M.: Lang, 2009. 209-28.
2008 “Das Ende des Menschen? Biopolitik im dystopischen Roman.” Amerikanisches Erzählen nach 2000: Eine Bestandsaufnahme. Ed. Sebastian Domsch. München: Edition Text & Kritik, 2008. 281-95.
Online-Publications
2014 “Biopunk 101.” SF 101: A Guide to Teaching and Studying Science Fiction [Kindle Version]. Ed. Ritch Calvin et al. Amazon.com. 2014.
2012 Virtual Introduction to Science Fiction: Online Toolkit for Teaching SF. Web. 2012-13.
2010 “Margaret Atwood: Oryx and Crake (2003).” Portal to the Fantastic. Universität Salzburg.
2009 “Dystopia, Alternate History and the Posthuman in BioShock.” Current Objectives in Postgraduate American Studies 10 (2009).
2007 “Fears of Globalization: Anti-Corporate Visions in Recent Utopian Texts.” Spaces of Utopia 6 (2007).
Translations
2016 John Rieder. “Zur Definition von SF oder auch nicht.” Das Science Fiction Jahr 2016. Ed. Sascha Mamczak and Hannes Riffel. Berlin: Golkonda, 2016. 89-121.
2013 Wendy B. Faris. “Scheherazades Kinder: Magischer Realismus und die postmoderne Fiktion.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 3.1 (2013): 98-127.
2012 Joanna Russ. “Versuch einer Ästhetik der Science Fiction.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 2.2 (2012): 95-108.
2012 Lyman Tower Sargent. “Wiedersehen mit den drei Gesichtern des Utopismus.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 2.1 (2012): 98-144.
2011 Robin Wood. “Der amerikanische Albtraum: Horror in the 1970er Jahren.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 1.1 (2011): 91-123.
Reviews and Miscellanea
2015 “Jire Emine Gözen. Cyberpunk Science Fiction: Literarische Fiktionen und Medientheorie.” Journal for the Fantastic in the Arts 26.2 (2015): 416-18.
2015 “British Film Institute. BFI Film Classics Series.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 5.2 (2015): 130-32
2015 “Dying Light.” SFRA Review 313 (2015): 61-64.
2015 “SF-Worlds and the First-Person Perspective.” Review of The Talos Principle and NaissanceE. SFRA Review 312 (2015): 33-36.
2015 “Rob Latham (ed.): The Oxford Handbook of Science Fiction.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 5.1 (2015): 176-79.
2014 “Gary Westfahl: William Gibson.” Journal for the Fantastic in the Arts 25.2 (2014): 515-18.
2014 “Vincent Terrace: Internet Horror, Science Fiction and Fantasy Television Series, 1998-2013.” SFRA Review 311 (2015): 32-33.
2014 “Researching the Apocalyptic: Veronika Wieser et al. Abendländische Apokalyptik“. Science Fiction Studies 41.3 (2014): 681-83.
2014 “Wolfenstein: The New Order.” SFRA Review 310 (2014): 57-60.
2014 “Sherryl Vint: Science Fiction.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 4.2 (2014): 128-31.
2014 “On the Look-Out for a New Urban Uncanny: Interview with China Miéville.” Extrapolation 55.1 (2014): 25-32.
2014 “Jeffrey Weinstock: The Ashgate Encyclopedia of Literary and Cinematic Monsters.” Zeitschrift für Fantastikforschung 4.1 (2014): 140-42.
2013 “XCOM: Enemy Unknown.” SFRA Review 305 (2013): 30-31.
2013 “Day Z.” SFRA Review 303 (2013): 19-21.
2012 “Splice.” Science Fiction Film and Television 5.1 (2012): 153-57.
2011 “Marcus Wohlsen: Biopunk.” Foundation 40.113 (2011): 64-68.
2011 “The Mongoliad.” SFRA Review 297 (2011): 62-63.
2011 “Nine Inch Nails: Year Zero.” SFRA Review 295 (2011): 28-29.
2010 “Fremde Welten Conference.” Journal for the Fantastic in the Arts (JFA) 21.3 (2010): 503.
Projects
Cyberpunk and Visual Culture
Cyberpunk science fiction emerged in a decade that saw an unprecedented ascendency of visual and virtual media in popular culture. Within the expansive mediascape of the 1980s and 1990s, cyberpunk’s aesthetics took firm root, relying heavily on visual motifs for its near-future splendor saturated in media technologies, both real and fictitious, such as video games, music videos, computer-generated worlds, augmented realities, consensual hallucinations, data networks, and many other technologies. As today’s realities look increasingly like the futures forecast in science fiction, cyberpunk speaks to our contemporary moment and as a cultural formation dominates our 21st century techno-digital landscapes.
The 15 essays gathered into Cyberpunk and Visual Culture engage the social and cultural changes that define our cyberpunk moment(s) and address the visual language and aesthetic repertoire of cyberpunk – from cybernetic organisms to light, energy, and data flows, from video screens to cityscapes, from the vibrant energy of today’s video games to the visual hues of comic book panels, and more. Unlike other anthologies that limit their analytical apparatus to literary cyberpunk, the essays of Cyberpunk and Visual Culture provide critical analysis, close readings, and aesthetic interpretations of exactly those visual elements that define cyberpunk today, moving beyond the limitations of merely printed text to also focus on the meaningfulness of images, forms, and compositions that are the heart and lifeblood of cyberpunk graphic novels, films, television shows, and video games.
Game of Thrones Research Project
“You know nothing, Jon Snow”. So said Ygritte, in one of the many memorable lines from Game of Thrones – before she died, cold, gruesomely and sadly. Her words are ‘immortalised’ on posters, t-shirts, mugs, panties. Poor Jon, too. To ‘die’ knowing so little…
We want to know. We are a team of researchers – and fascinated followers of the series – who want to know something before we too die… We want to understand what it is about this show that people of different kinds love, and cannot let go. Or what has annoyed some people, and upset them. Will you help us, please, by completing our survey – and telling other people about it? We promise – as we have always done in the past – to share what we learn, in lots of ways. We are entirely independent. We have no connections with George RR Martin or HBO, or with the cast of the show (though, let’s be honest, we would love to have!!).
Who are we? We are all university researchers, who are undertaking this project without funding support of any kind. We’ve sensed that Game of Thrones is significant, and important, a Game-Changer (bad pun) – but we’re not (yet) sure how. All of us have been involved in previous audience projects, of different kinds. Some of us researched responses to the films of The Lord of the Rings (and then The Hobbit) a few years back. That taught us a great deal. Some of us are currently researching the revived Star Wars franchise. But Game of Thrones is different, clearly. Has there ever been such a doom-ridden, death-ridden epic series before? “Winter is coming”, indeed. If you want to know about who we are, and what exactly we are trying to find out. Upcoming Talks and Conferences
“Die Farbe aus dem All: Das Böse, das Fremde und die Vergangenheit in Huan Vus Die Farbe (2011).” 8. Internationale Konferenz der Gesellschaft für Fantastikforschung. Wien, September 2017. Memberships
Gesellschaft für Fantastikforschung
Science Fiction Research Association
International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts
Society for Cinema and Media Studies
European Network for Cinema and Media Studies
Gesellschaft für Medienwissenschaft
