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Languages, Linguistics and Film

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Professor Astrid Köhler, Dr. Phil

Astrid

Professor of German Literature and Comparative Cultural Studies; Co-Head of Modern Languages and Cultures

Email: a.kohler@qmul.ac.uk
Telephone: +44 (0)207 7882 8303
Room Number: Arts One 2.03
Office Hours: Wednesdays 10am-12pm, or by appointment

Profile

I teach modules on German and Comparative literature and culture from the 18th century to the present day, as well as literary translation from English into German. I am the convenor of the Literature Section of the Centre for Anglo-German Cultural Relations and co-editor of ANGERMION, the Centre’s yearbook.

My research interests are divided between two broad fields: the Cultural History of late 18th & 19th Century Europe on the one hand, and contemporary German Literature on the other.

With regard to the latter, I have published widely on East German authors before and after German Re-Unification, such as the monograph Brückenschläge in 2007, and an intellectual biography of the author Klaus Schlesinger in 2011 (www.perlentaucher.de/buch/astrid-koehler/klaus-schlesinger.html). Together with Robert Gillett, I have produced the historical-critical edition of Uwe Johnson’s 1959 novel Mutmassungen über Jakob and an edition of the complete poems of Adolf Endler (www.wallstein-verlag.de/9783835319493-die-gedichte.html).   

As to the former, I have published widely on salons and other forms of sociability in the early 19th century as well as on the public rituals and festivities, literary journals and prose fiction of the period.  Since 2019 I have been engaged in interdisciplinary research on the history of European spa culture and literature (see current research).  

I also work as a translator from English into German, covering historical narrative, experimental prose and poetry.

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