
Professor, Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies
Ph.D. Princeton University
M.A. Princeton University
B.A. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Office: Lowerre Academic Center, OfficeÌę6
Phone: +41 91 986 36 53
Email:Ìęcwiedmer@fus.edu
Caroline Wiedmer is professor of Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies (CLCS) and received her PhD from Princeton University with a dissertation on memory of the Holocaust in Germany and France. She is the author and (co)-editor of a number of books and articles circling questions of memory, motherhood, the intersections of law, narrative and culture, the maritime port as a space of trade and cultural exchange, and various forms of sustainability. She is currently at work on a project on the refugee politics in Europe and on a co-authored book, with Rafael Newman, on the confluence of industry, nation-building and literature in a small Swiss village in 19th century Emmental.
At Franklin she has spearheaded programs in Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies, Social Justice and Sustainability, and a Sustainable Cities program in Zurich. She has built, together with Christoph Kueffer, the Center for Environmental Justice and Sustainable Futures (CJSF), and, with Johanna Fassl, the Scholarships Without Borders program which welcomes refugees to Franklin. She is Co-Chair of the Division of Arts and Culture, co-director of the CJSF, and director of Franklinâs Zurich Program.
She has received grants and research fellowships from Princeton University, the University of London, the Center for Gender Studies of the University of Basel, the NEH program at Stanford University, the Collegium Helveticum at the ETH in ZĂŒrich, the Center for Advanced German and European Studies of the Freie UniversitĂ€t of Berlin, and the Swiss National Science Foundation. She is a member of the Swiss section of Scholars at Risk (SAR), co-editor for Franklinâs journal intervalla and a member of the TETI group which explores textures and experiences of trans-industriality.
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Research interests:
Her research interests include memory studies, gender, film, law and culture, spatiality, and the workings of narrative in multiple domains of cultural and intellectual life. She is currently at work on a study of street newspapers and the construction of public space.
Publications:
Books and edited volumes:
Maritime Poetics: From Coast to Hinterlands, ed. with Gabriel Gee, Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2021.
Intersections of Law and Culture. Co-editor with Priska Gisler and Sara Steinert Borella. London: Palgrave MacMillan,Ìę 2012.
Motherhood and Space: Configurations of the Maternal in Politics, Art and the Every-day. Ed. with Sarah Hardy, London: Palgrave Macmillan, January 2006.
Inventing the Past: Essays on Memory, Trauma and Culture. Ed. with Otto Heim, International Cooper Series in English Language and Literature, forthcoming Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 2005.
The Claims of Memory: Representations of the Holocaust in Contemporary Germany and France. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1999.
Edited Journals and Reports:
Neue Akteurgruppen fĂŒr die BiodiversitĂ€t in der Schweiz, with Christoph Kueffer, Ariane Tanner, Marta Wartenweiler, Hella Wiedmer-Newman, Jasmin JoshiÌę(2020), report to the Bundesamtes fĂŒr Umwelt (BAFU), Bern (Project co-leaders: Kueffer and Wiedmer), BAFU, 2020.
Environmental Justice, âCollapseâ and the Question of Evidence, intervalla 3, with Christoph Kueffer, Brack Hale and Sara Steinert Borella, 2015Ìę
Trauma, Abstraction, and Creativity, intervalla 2, with Johanna Fassl, 2014
Sound Changes: An International Survey of Womenâs Career Strategies in HigherÌęEducation, universelle 4, Zurich: Ropress Genossenschaft, 2001
Journal articles and book chapter:
âRefugees in Higher Educationâ, forthcoming in intervalla, edited by Johanna Fassl, 2022Ìę
âLiquid Knowledge and Experiential Learningâ, forthcoming in intervalla, edited by Fabio Ferrari and Kate Roy, 2021.
"The Family Plot: Overrun by the Future, Underwritten by the Past," with Rafaël Newman, forthcoming in Mobile Soils, ed, by Anne-Laure Franchette, Gabriel N. Gee, and José Caceres Mardones, forthcoming Zurich: TETI Press, 2021.
Ìę"Introspections" in Maritime Poetics: From Coast to Hinterlands, with Gabriel Gee, forthcoming, Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2021.
"The Logistics of Border Regimes from the Mediterranean to its Hinterlands" in Maritime Poetics: From Coast to Hinterland, edited by Gabriel Gee and Caroline Wiedmer, forthcoming, Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2021.
"Time for a Biodiversity Turn in Sustainability Science," with Christoph Kueffer, Manuela Di Giulio, Katrin Hauser, GAIA, vol.30, pp. 77-89, 2020
âMelinda Nadj Abonji and Jurczok 1001: Performance, Politics, and Poetry,â with RafaĂ«l Newman in The Short Story in German in the Twenty-First Century, ed. by Lyn Marven, Andrew Plowman, Kate Roy, London: Camden Press, 2020
"Forced Entanglements: Stories of Expulsion, Sovereign Power and Bare Life," Kulturwissenschaftliche Zeitschrift, de Gruyter, vol. 2, 2019
"Applying the Environmental Humanities?," with Christoph Kueffer, Philippe ForĂȘt, Marcus Hall, GAIA, vol. 23, pp. 87-93, 2018
âStories from the Hothouse: Climate Garden 2085â: "Geschichten aus dem Treibhaus: Climate Garden 2085â, in a bilingual edition in Climate Garden 2085: Handbook for a Public Experiment, eds. Juanita SchlĂ€pfer and Daniela Dahinden, Zurich: Park Books, June, 2017
âEnvironmental Justice, Collapse and the Question of Evidence,â with Christoph Kueffer, Brack Hale and Sara Steinert Borella, intervalla 3, 2015
âRogue Memories: Reflections on Trauma, Art and Technology,â with Johanna Fassl, intervalla 2, 2014
âDeveloping the Environmental Humanities: A Swiss Perspective,â with Christoph Kueffer, Philippe ForĂȘt, Marcus Hal, GAIA, vol. 23, pp. 67-69, 2014
âIntroduction: Geometries of Law and Culture,â in Intersections of Law and Culture, ed. with Priska Gisler and Sara Steinert-Borella, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012
âFemale Genital Cutting, Migration and the Art of Legal Boundary Maintenance,â in Intersections of Law and Culture, ed. with Priska Gisler and Sara Steinert-Borella, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012
âStrangers in Paradise: Swiss Migration Between Multiculturalism and Hybridity,â in From Multiculturalism to Hybridity: New Approaches to Teaching Modern Switzerland, eds. Karin Baumgartner and Margrit Zinggeler, Fall 2010
âThe Politics and Poetics of Reading Street Newspapers,â PMLA, vol. 125, no. 2, March 2010, pp. 437-442
âDouble Lives, Double Narratives: Tracing the Story of the Family in Rousseau, the Swiss Civil Code and the Fathersâ Rights Debates,â Feminist Legal Studies, vol. 17, no. 2, August 2009, pp. 185-204
âIllegitime Eltern: Zur rechtlichen (Neu-) Verteilung der Geschlechterrollen in Schweizer Familien,â in Wandel der GeschlechterverhĂ€ltnisse durch Recht, ed. Michelle Cottier, Zurich: Dike Verlag, 2008
âGeschichten von Macht, Raum und Mutterschaft in der Schweizer Akademie, Debates,â in Gender in Motion: Die Konstruktion von Geschlecht in Raum und ErzĂ€hlung, eds. Dominique Grisard, Jana HĂ€berlein, Anelis Kaiser und Sibylle Saxer, Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2007
âAuf den Spuren einer rĂ€umlichen Narratologie. Raum, Zeit und Narrativ im GesprĂ€ch,â in Gender in Motion: Die Konstruktion von Geschlecht in Raum und ErzĂ€hlung, eds. Dominique Grisard, Jana HĂ€berlein, Anelis Kaiser und Sibylle Saxer, Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2007
âAn Office of Oneâs Own: Stories of Power, Space, and Motherhood in the Swiss Academy,â in Motherhood and Space: Configurations of the Maternal in Politics, Home, and the Body, eds. Sarah Hardy and Caroline Wiedmer, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005
âGeographies of Motherhood: An Introduction,â in Motherhood and Space: Configurations of the Maternal in Politics, Home, and the Body, eds. Sarah Hardy and Caroline Wiedmer, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005
âThe Workings of Memory and the Dialectics of Culture,â with Otto Heim, in Inventing the Past: Memory Work in Culture and History, eds. Otto Heim and Caroline Wiedmer, International Cooper Series in English Language and Literature, Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 2005
âJustice by Legal Means: The Case of Sabine and Charles Sonabend,â in Inventing the Past: Memory Work in Culture and History, eds. Otto Heim and Caroline Wiedmer, International Cooper Series in English Language and Literature, Basel: Schwabe Verlag, 2005
âGesetz und NarrativitĂ€t: Notizen zu einer Anatomie", in Wissenschaft und WelterzĂ€hlung: Die narrative Ordnung der Dinge, ed. Matthias Michel, Zurich: Edition Collegium Helveticum 1, 2003
âMemory, Law and Literature: Reflections of World War II in Swiss-Jewish Literature,â in Coming to Terms with âWhatâ Past?: New Perspectives on the Holocaust and Its Place in the Twentieth Century, eds., Robert D. Levy and William Brustein , Greenwood/Praeger, 2002
âOdysseusâ Tattoo: On Daniel Ganzfriedâs The Sender and Binjamin Wilkomirskiâs Fragments,â with RafaĂ«l Newman, in Literary Friendship, Literary Paternity: Studies in Honor of Stanley Corngold, ed, Gerhard Richter, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002
âThe Glass Ceiling in German-Speaking Switzerland,â in Sound Changes: An International Comparison of Womenâs Career Strategies in Higher Education, ed. Caroline Wiedmer, ZĂŒrich: Ropress Genossenschaft, 2002
â ,â an article on transdisciplinarity, eds. Helga Nowotny, Martina Weiss, Karin HĂ€nni, Jahrbuch des Collegium Helveticum der ETH ZĂŒrich, Zurich: Hochschulverlag AG an der ETH ZĂŒrich, 2001
Review of Barbie Zelitzer, Remembering to Forget, Biography 21.3, winter 2000
âAkademische Freiheiten, glĂ€serne Leitern, mögliche Alternativen: Nachwuchs-und Frauenförderung an Hochschulen in den USA und in der Schweiz,â Neue ZĂŒrcher Zeitung, November 7, 2000, p. B37
âLocus et Imagines,â in Arbeitsbuch fĂŒr ein Denkmal in Berlin, eds. Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock, Berlin: Vogt Verlag, 1999
âDesigns of Memory: A Memorial in Schöneberg and the Jewish Museum in Berlin,â Alphabet City 3/4, fall 1995
Awards and Honors:
Grant from the Cooper International Series in English Literature and Culture, to support publication of co-edited book on Memory and Trauma (August 2005), with Schwabe Verlag in Basel.
Grant from the Competence Center for Gender Studies at the University of ZurichÌę