University of Cambridge, 1-3 October 2002

The research group ‘Cultural History and Literary Imagination’ is based in the German Department of the University of Cambridge, and is primarily concerned with the relationship between literary texts and their cultural and historical contexts, whether these are conceived in social, political or intellectual terms. The planned conference ‘The Fragile Tradition’ is intended to provide an opportunity to investigate the forms and functions of the cultural imagination, and the way it is reflected in literary und discursive texts, in the German language area since 1500. Contributions which focus either on moments of radical change in German culture or on the continuities which lie behind the apparent discontinuities would be welcome.

The organisers would particularly welcome contributions germane to the issues which the research group has identified for its longer-term programme. With the conference theme in mind, these issues might be defined as follows:

a) Changes in the material culture of the German-speaking world and their reflection in literature, including the impact of scientific and technological developments and changes of cultural paradigm (e.g. literary responses to scientific thinking and scientific views of the world, the materiality of knowledge and its representation in literary and discursive texts, the impact of industrialisation, social change, the influence of new media and their anthropological dimension).

b) The construction of cultural meaning through literary texts, models of historical explanation, forms of historiographical representation, and media systems, particularly with reference to continuities and discontinuities of cultural and political identity, or of ‘national consciousness, and with reference to the canonisation (or subversion) of lines of tradition.

c) The status and the forms of historical and cultural memory, particularly the cultural constitution of tradition and memory, and the spatial and visual expression of cultural memories (lieux de mémoire in the sense promoted by Pierre Nora), the dynamic metaphors by which cultural memory is transmitted, and its representation in literary and discursive texts and visual media.

d) Questions of the methodology of a trans-disciplinary and historically orientated investigation of cultural thinking and its representation in the medium of text, image, film, etc. Of particular interest here is the question of how to deal with diverse media when constructing and interpreting cultural developments historically.

Contributions may be in either English or German. The organisers expect to be able to publish a selection of the papers in a volume designed to provide orientation among the fundamental issues of the historical interpretation of cultural phenomena, and to serve as a showcase of the interaction of English and German scholarship in this area.

Please send your proposal (title and short summary of content) by 1 May 2002 to one of the following:

Dr David Midgley
Director of Studies in Modern Languages
St John’s College
Cambridge CB2 1TP
United Kingdom
e-mail: drm7@joh.cam.ac.uk

Dr Christian Emden
Research Fellow
Sidney Sussex College
Cambridge CB2 3HU
United Kingdom
e-mail: cje22@cam.ac.uk