Playground of gender : cross-dressing and self-mutilation as negation of gender identity in Tanja Duckers’s Spielzone (1999)

Although it is an outstanding example of writing life as negotiation of gender roles as well as exploration of the body as site of identity constructs, Tanja Dückers’s novel Spielzone, published in 1999, has not yet received the critical attention it deserves. The novel displays an interesting aesthetic technique of representing the milieu of two Berlin districts and their inhabitants, whose identity conflicts can be shown to reflect the state of construction of the urban space before its homogenization through gentrification. Especially with regard to gender identities, Dückers portrays the search for a different lifestyle, which is expressed through a striking focus on aesthetic differentiation and cross-dressing. The protagonists stage masculinity and femininity through a theatrical masquerade, which reveals the construct of gender identities and advocates a postmodern transgender existence. The negotiation of a new identity without binary gender attributions ranges from the negation of traditional role assignments to self-mutilation. In the following paper, Dückers’s text will be analysed as uncanny playground of gender between masquerade and brutal gender embodiment, which nevertheless, with all its negations of conventional values, eventually moves near to a return to traditional patterns.peer-reviewe

Ironic inversions: Geographical and political islands in F.C. Delius’ Stroll from Rostock to Syracuse (1995)

The paper analyses Friedrich Christian Delius’ story Der Spaziergang von Rostock nach Syrakus (1995) in the context of island discourses and the discursive construction of insular spaces. It argues that, in a satirical adaptation of Seume’s Stroll to Syracuse (1803), Delius reconceptualises the Mediterranean island of Sicily as the traditional place of longing in German travel literature since the 18th century by contrasting it to the political ‘island’ of the GDR. He constructs the socialist state as a place of yearning and develops a counter-discourse to the established European island imaginary

Ironische Verkehrungen: Geographische und politische Inseln in F.C. Delius’ Der Spaziergang von Rostock nach Syrakus (1995)

The paper analyses Friedrich Christian Delius’ story Der Spaziergang von Rostock nach Syrakus (1995) in the context of island discourses and the discursive construction of insular spaces. It argues that, in a satirical adaptation of Seume’s Stroll to Syracuse (1803), Delius reconceptualises the Mediterranean island of Sicily as the traditional place of longing in German travel literature since the 18th century by contrasting it to the political ‘island’ of the GDR. He constructs the socialist state as a place of yearning and develops a counter-discourse to the established European island imaginary.peer-reviewe

European islands between isolated and interconnected life worlds. Interdisciplinary long-term perspectives

In the context of the so-called spatial turn in cultural and social studies, geographical space has been reconsidered as a cultural phenomenon moving away from the notion of space as a given constant and instead acknowledging its cultural component, defined and semanticised by its users and their practices. At the interface of materiality and discursivity, the island becomes a highly interesting as well as paradigmatic site for the negotiation of a specific ‘islandness’ (Hay 2006) from ‘within’ on the one hand and the metaphorical construction of the island from ‘outside’ on the other, having been a space for inspiration and projections to philosophers and writers for centuries. Against the backdrop of Michel de Certeau’s ‘Practice of Every-day Life’ (1980) and his theory of the two-fold appropriation of space, as well as Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s notion of the smooth and gridded space (‘Capitalism and Schizophrenia’, 1980), the following paper seeks to explore the imaginary construction of the island space from two perspectives: (i) the appropriation of the island by walking on the ground, and (ii) from a bird’s eye perspective from above. These perspectives create two opposite notions of the island and contribute to the establishment of various discourses on the insular, representing different power structures and critical takes on social life, confirming as well as subverting established discourses. Using a comparative approach, different examples of constructions of islands from European literary history will be employed, mainly drawing on the genre of the Robinsonade. One central imaginary of the island in European literature is the island in the far sea, often in the Pacific; this is analysed as a pre-dominant construction of insularity in the following narratives: ‘Robinson Crusoe’ by Daniel Defoe (1719), ‘ Suzanne and the Pacific’ by Jean Giraudoux (1921), ‘The Wall’ by Marlen Haushofer (1963), ‘Friday or The Other Island’ by Michel Tournier (1967), ‘Atlas of Remote Islands’ by Judith Schalansky (2009) and ‘The Pine Islands’ by Marion Poschmann (2017).peer-reviewe

Jahrbuch für Internationale Germanistik: Wege der Germanistik in transkultureller Perspektive

Die auffällige Hinwendung zum Inselmotiv in der deutschsprachigen Literatur der letzten Jahrzehnte lässt auf eine Neubewertung traditioneller literarischer Kategorien schließen, anhand derer aktuelle politische Themen und Denkmuster thematisiert und in Frage gestellt werden. In Christian Krachts Imperium (2012), Thomas Hettches Pfaueninsel (2014) oder Marion Poschmanns Kieferninseln (2017) beispielweise – um nur einige wenige zu nennen – wird die Insel zum Verhandlungsraum von aktuellen Fragestellungen nach Konstruktionen des Exotischen, des (Post-)Kolonialen oder der Ambiguität. Aufgrund ihrer räumlichen Beschaffenheit eignet sich die Insel bekanntermaßen gut als literarischer Schauplatz des Experimentierens mit gesellschaftlichen Formen, utopischen und dystopischen Zukunftsvisionen oder Fragen nach Ausgrenzung und Inklusion. Ihre vermehrte Darstellung in der Literatur verweist jedoch auch auf die politische Relevanz einer Neuaushandlung herkömmlicher Auffassungen von Zentrum und Peripherie sowie die Notwendigkeit einer Neudefinition von räumlichen Kategorien nach dem spatial turn in den Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften. Durch ihre spezifische Räumlichkeit werden Inseln zum Brennglas sozialer und politischer Phänomene, die sich auch in ästhetischen Konstruktionen von Inseln widerspiegeln, denn, wie Pete Hay in seiner Phenomenology of Islands treffend formuliert, Inseln sind „paradigmatic places, topographies of meaning in which the qualities that construct place are dramatically distilled“ (Hay 2006: 31). In Zeiten der Globalisierung, die gerade auch eine Sehnsucht nach räumlicher Verortung mit sich bringt, wendet sich die Analyse des Inseltopos in der Literatur einem prägnanten Motiv zu, anhand dessen aktuelle, aber auch historische Ereignisse im Kontext von Migration und Räumen literarisch reflektiert werden.peer-reviewe

Island Fictions and Metaphors in Contemporary Literature

In recent years, there has generally been an increasing scholarly interest in island literature. German-language literature and scholarship concerning it have proven highly relevant to the analysis of contemporary island literature, yet these are rarely recognised within English-language island studies publications. The editorial introduction to this special thematic section on Island Fictions and Metaphors in Contemporary Literature sets the stage for further analyses

Introduction [Shima, 17(1)]

This issue of Shima consolidates research on a number of areas explored in previous theme and general issues. Articles 1, 6 and 7 arose from a call for papers on “The island as ‘watery land’: water-land interfaces in island discourses, experiences and practices: Ecocritical, political and cultural perspectives”. This call was initiated in the context of on-going research within the DFG (German Research Foundation) funded Island Studies Network: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Island Exchanges, Environments, and Perceptions. Etymologically, island means ‘watery land’, going back to Old English – ‘of or pertaining to water’, ‘watery’, and land (OED, 2022). Linguistically, then, islands transgress the binary opposition between land and water. Rather than just being land surrounded by water, they are themselves characterised by water. Island Studies has long emphasised the close connection between terrestrial and aquatic spaces and in recent decades has turned to the study of the multifarious interrelations between islands and water, for instance with the concept of aquapelago, which conceives (some) archipelagic areas as “an intermeshed and interactive marine/land environment” (Hayward, 2012, p.5). Islands’ watery or ecotonal character (Gillis, 2014) shapes human behaviour on the edge of two ecosystems. The opposition between land and water, however, remains a dominant discursive pattern and is connected to other distinctions playing a fundamental role in Western discourses (Moser, 2005, pp. 408:409): the contrast between structured and amorphous space, order and chaos, the human world and its other. Focussing on islands as ‘watery lands’ and on related socio-cultural contexts muddies such seemingly clear-cut distinctions and highlights different perspectives on nature and culture, not as dichotomy but as inseparably intertwined. Developing such non-dichotomous viewpoints and strengthening their influence within hegemonic discourses and practices has become increasingly urgent in times of accelerated environmental destruction and anthropogenic climate change.peer-reviewe

Multifactorial intervention for hip and pelvic fracture patients with mild to moderate cognitive impairment: study protocol of a dual-centre randomised controlled trial (OF-CARE)

Abstract Background A hip or pelvic fracture is a major fall-related injury which often causes a decline in mobility performance and physical activity. Over 40% of patients with hip fracture have cognitive impairment or dementia and poorer rehabilitation outcomes than those without cognitive impairment. In this subgroup, there is a lack of evidence on the best practices supporting recovery. The main aim of this study is to investigate the effects of a transitional care intervention after inpatient rehabilitation on physical activity and functional performance in this group of cognitively impaired patients. Methods/design This dual-centre, randomised controlled trial compares a multifactorial intervention with usual care as control condition. Two hundred and forty community-dwellers (≥ 65 years) with a hip or pelvic fracture and mild to moderate cognitive impairment (MMSE 17–26) are recruited at the end of inpatient rehabilitation. The four-month intervention consists of (a) an individually tailored, progressive home exercise program and physical activity promotion delivered by professional instructors and lay instructors (two home visits per week) and (b) a long-term care counselling approach addressing unmet care needs, pleasurable activities, and caregiver issues if needed. Primary outcome parameters are physical activity, measured as daily walking duration with an accelerometer-based activity monitor (activPAL™) over 72 h, and functional performance, assessed with Short Physical Performance Battery sum scores. Secondary outcome parameters are fear of falling, fall related self-efficacy, falls, quality of life, depression and activity of daily living. Data are collected at the end of rehabilitation, before the intervention at the patient’s home (baseline), after four months (post-intervention), and seven months (follow-up). In addition to completer and intent-to-treat analyses of outcomes, economic data and incremental cost-effectiveness are analysed. Discussion Existing service models of volunteer services and legal counselling provided by care counsellors were considered when developing the intervention protocol. Therefore, it should be feasible to translate and deliver the intervention into real-world practice if it has been demonstrated to be effective. Trial registration German Clinical Trials Register, DRKS00008863 (Accessed 17 Apr 2019), ISRCTN registry, ISRCTN69957256 (Accessed 17 Apr 2019)