Forschungsschwerpunkte

Gegenwartsliteratur und Comics,

Life Writing (Autofiktion, autobiografische/r Roman, Tagebuch, Autothanatografie),

Literary Disability Studies, Graphic Medicine,

Feminist und Gender Studies

Vorträge

“Aufklärungsmodi und Körperpolitiken in deutschsprachigen feministischen Comics der Gegenwart,” Freie Universität Berlin, Offener Hörsaal - Ringvorlesung, 18 Februar 2021

“Comic - Kunst - Körper. Konstruktion und Subversion von Körperbildern im Comic. Einleitende Überlegungen,” mit Irmela Krüger-Fürhoff, Freie Universität Berlin, Offener Hörsaal - Ringvorlesung, 12 November 2020

“The Un/timeliness of Death and Grieving - the Significance of Photographs in Graphic Narratives of Bereavement,” Freie Universität Berlin, CorpoRealities: Perceptions of 'Extraordinary' Time in Literature and Comics, 25-27 Juni 2020

“Girlsplaining: A Comparison of German Graphic Art in the Era of the Suffrage Campaign and Contemporary Comics,” mit Caroline Bland, University College Dublin, WiGS Conference, 8-9 November 2019

“Embodied Experience and Contested Autonomy: Discussing Comics on Anorexia with Medical Students in an Ethics of Medicine Lecture on Patient Consent,” mit Irmela Krüger-Fürhoff, Susanne Michl und Ulrike Schulz, Freie Universität Berlin, Comics Put to Practice: Illness Narratives as Tools of Empowerment in the Medical Sphere, 18 Oktober 2019

"Expanding the Canon of Graphic Medicine. Critical Visions of the Beginning and End of Life in Contemporary German-language Comics", mit stef lenk und Irmela Krüger-Fürhoff, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Que(e)rying Graphic Medicine. Paradigms, Power, and Practices, 11-13 Juli 2019

"Suffrage Art im Dialog mit heutigen feministischen Comics", mit Caroline Bland, Freie Universität Berlin, Graphische Kunst und Feminismus heute und vor 100 Jahren, 4 Juli 2019

"'nach den narkosen': Krankheit in der Literatur der Gegenwart", Lesung und Buchvorstellung mit Paul-Henri Campbell, Lettrétage Berlin, 11 Februar 2019  

"Beyond the Personal: The Social Critique of German Graphic Medicine", Aston University, 30th WiGS Anniversary Conference, 9-10 November 2018

"German Graphic Medicine Voicing Systemic Critique: the Relation of Work, Illness and Dying in Elke R. Steiner’s Risiken und Nebenwirkungen (2010) and Marijpol’s Eremit (2013)", Wyndham Grand
Pittsburgh, 42nd GSA Annual Conference (German Studies Association), 27-­30 September 2018

"Over/writing the Father? Crossing Dementia and the National Socialist Past in Tilman Jens’s Demenz (2009)", Freie Universität Berlin, Dementia, Violence, and the Politics of Memory in Contemporary Literature, Film, and Comics, 13-15 September 2018

“Literarische Darstellungen der Kommunikation über Krankheit – literarische Darstellungen als Kommunikation von Krankheit”, Sheraton Atlanta, 41st GSA Annual Conference (German Studies Association), German Life Writing Seminar, 5-8 Oktober 2017

“Sharing Memories of Loss: the Role of Photographs in Graphic Narratives of Bereavement”, Universiteit Gent, NNCORE Conference: Comics and Memory, 19-21 April 2017

“Self-reflexive Uses of Photography in Graphic Narratives Relating Dying and Bereavement”, Universität zu Köln, 3. Workshop der AG Comicforschung der Gesellschaft für Medienwissenschaft: Formen der Selbstreflexivität im Medium Comic, 2-3 März 2017 

“Voicing the Dying Self – Anticipating the ‘After-image’: Wolfgang Herrndorf’s Cancer Diary Arbeit und Struktur (2010-2013)”, Aberystwyth University, 28th WiGS Conference (Women in German Studies), 4-5 November 2016

“Between Visibility and Vulnerability – Representations of Illness in Comics and Literature Today, and their Challenge to the Reader”, Leeds Central Library, Comics Forum 2016, Genre: A Conference on Comics, 3-4 November 2016

“How to Read Patho/Graphics, or: Ways of Looking”, Freie Universität Berlin, Pathography and Graphic Medicine: The Genres of PathoGraphics, 13-15 Oktober 2016

“Photographing Disability and Curating a Research-Related Exhibition”, Durham University, 27th WiGS Conference, 6-7 November 2015

“Rediscovering the Autobiographical. Reading a new German Literature on Illness and Dying through the Lens of Disability Studies”, Lancaster University, Fictions of Corporeal Diversity: A Symposium on Literary Disability Studies, 4 Juni 2015

“Illness Writing and the Diary Genre in their Contemporary German Context: Christoph Schlingensief and Wolfgang Herrndorf’s Cancer Diaries”, Bangor University, Research Forum of the School of Modern Languages: Storying Illness and Death in Contemporary German Literature and Film, 11 März 2015

“Die neue Selbstreflexion – Krankheit und Sterben im autobiografischen Schreiben der Gegenwart”, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Social Turn in der Literatur(wissenschaft)? – interphilologische winter school der graduate school ‘practices of literature’, 3-5 Dezember 2014

“The Image Speaks”, The University of York, External Engagement in the Arts & Humanities, gefördert von der British Academy und des White Rose College of the Arts & Humanities, 19 Mai 2014

“Writing Illness from Beyond the Border – Verena Stefan’s Breast Cancer Narrative Fremdschläfer (2007)”, The University of Manchester, 77th AGS conference, 9-11 April 2014

“Writing Breast Cancer Autobiographically in Verena Stefan’s Fremdschläfer [Alien Sleeper] (2007)”, The University of Sheffield, School of Languages and Cultures Research Seminar: Cultural Discourses of Illness, 3 April 2014

“Writing Illness Autobiographically in Kathrin Schmidt’s Du stirbst nicht (2009)”, The University of Sheffield, 25th anniversary WiGS Conference, 8-9 November 2013

“Looking beyond the Self – Reflecting the Other in Kathrin Schmidt’s Du stirbst nicht”, Universität Wien, IABA Europe Conference 2013 ‘Beyond the Subject: New Developments in Life Writing’, 31 Oktober-3 November 2013

“‘[E]ndlich normal geworden’? – Reassembling an Image of the Self in Kathrin Schmidt’s Du stirbst nicht”, University of Nottingham, DAAD Summer School: Norms, Normality, Normalisation, 2-6 Juli 2013

“‘[I]mmer so ekelhafte Gedanken’ – Illness, Death and the Female Grotesque in Charlotte Roche’s Schoßgebete”, Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies, Research Seminar: The Aesthetics of Disgust: Revolting Bodies and Other Gruesome Things in post-1990 Women's Writing, 26 Juni 2013  

Monographie

The Wounded Self: Writing Illness in Twenty-First-Century German Literature. Studies in German Literature, Linguistics, and Culture (Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2018)

“The Wounded Self breaks new ground to interpret personal narratives of illness with the tools of canonical literary analysis. […] Schmidt’s impeccable scholarship explains why we haven’t analyzed illness narratives more deeply, convinces us why we should, and shows us how we can.”

Elizabeth C. Hamilton, Gegenwartsliteratur 18 (2019)

"Nina Schmidt’s study of illness writing in contemporary German-language literature not only fills notable gaps in scholarship on the primary texts she analyzes, but also knits together a wide range of scholarship on autofiction, disability studies, and (not only German) illness writing into an engaging study of great importance. [...] Schmidt sets a strong precedent for a shift in German studies scholarship on narratives of illness, disability, and dying."

Alexandra M. Hill, German Studies Review 42.2 (2019)

"Insgesamt ist The Wounded Self ein wissenschaftlich herausragendes Buch, das zukünftige Debatten zum Thema Autobiografie, Autofiktion, Disability Studies und Illness Writing maßgeblich beeinflussen sollte. Neben der Germanistik und der Kulturwissenschaft wird es von großem Interesse für die Medical Humanities sein."

Ina Linge, Weimarer Beiträge 65.1 (2019)

Aufsätze

‘Beyond the Personal: The Systemic Critique of German Graphic Medicine’, Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies 56.3/4 (forthcoming), 368-388

‘Ways of Looking: Reading PathoGraphics,’ in PathoGraphics: Narrative, Aesthetics, Contention, Community, hg. Susan Merrill Squier und Irmela Marei Krüger-Fürhoff (University Park: Penn State UP, 2020), S. 39-58.

‘Autobiographische Krankheitserzählungen in der Gegenwartsliteratur: Siri Hustvedt, Paul Kalanithi, Verena Stefanʼ, Diegesis – Interdisziplinäres E-Journal für Erzählforschung 6.2 (2017), 138-159

‘Confronting Cancer Publicly – Christoph Schlingensief’s So schön wie hier kanns im Himmel gar nicht sein! Tagebuch einer Krebserkrankung’, Oxford German Studies 44.1 (2015), 100-112

‘[E]ndlich normal gewordenʼ? Reassembling an Image of the Self in Kathrin Schmidt’s Du stirbst nicht (2009)’, in Norms, normality and normalization: papers from the postgraduate summer school in German Studies, Nottingham, July 2013, hg. Matthias Uecker et al. (Nottingham: Nottingham eprints, 2014), S. 65-78

‘Autofiction and Trauma: Negotiating Vulnerable Subject Positions in Charlotte Roche’s Schoßgebete,’ Auto/Fiction 1.1 (2013), 61-86

Autorenseite

‘Kathrin Schmidt’, Centre for the Study of Contemporary Women’s Writing, 2014

Rezensionen

Sonja E. Klocke: Inscription and Rebellion: Illness and the Symptomatic Body in East German Literature, Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2015, 248 S., in: The Modern Language Review 112.3 (2017), 748-750

Carsten Heinze, Alfred Hornung (Hg.): Medialisierungsformen des (Auto-)Biografischen, Konstanz/ München: UVK, 2013, 356 S., in: Biography 37.3 (2014), 869-874

Anne Fuchs, Kathleen James-Chakraborty & Linda Shortt (Hg.): Debating German Cultural Identity since 1989, Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2011, 264 S., in: Deutsch: Lehren und Lernen 48 (2013)