Keynote Speaker: Mary Lindemann
German Studies Association President 2017-2018
Professor and Chair, Department of History, University of Miami

From de Gaulle to Khrushchev, from the Christian Democrats to displaced refugees, from Putin to Trump, from the drag queen Olivia Jones to right-wing politician Frauke Petry, politics can make for “surprising partnerships.” It was William Shakespeare who wrote in The Tempest that “Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.” Both in Germany and beyond, the recent past has been experienced as a disorienting period by many. Debates about post-truth, post-liberalism, and post-humanism reflect seismic cultural shifts and pose the question whether we have entered a new political era. Thus, the phrase “politics makes strange bedfellows” captures our own Zeitgeist in most succinct fashion.
These are perplexing times to be certain. But peculiar alliances or combinations are common in a variety of historical and political contexts as well as in a diverse array of cultural and artistic engagements. The Berlin Program Summer Workshop 2018 invites contributions from scholars, artists, representatives of cultural institutions, and engaged others on the topic of “strange bedfellows” as well as “unexpected allies.”
This workshop seeks to advance critical reflection on these phenomena, their usefulness and potential limits as narrative devices in a broad array of disciplines that intersect with German Studies, including Anthropology, Art History, Film Studies, Gender Studies, History, Philosophy, Political Science, and Sociology. Possible topics include, but are by no means limited to:
- Studies of individuals, collectives or networks engaged in alliance building in contemporary or historical context
- Unexpected coalitions in political, economic, or social contexts
- Histories of political realignment
- Cultural expressions of unexpected solidarity
- Analyses of unexpected social integration of diverse groups
- Anthropological studies of subcultural group interactions
- Studies in linguistic transformations informed by unusual circumstances
- Aesthetic objects bridging unanticipated terrain
- Technical developments or emerging media forms bridging divides
- Theoretical approaches to collaborations among political, social, cultural “odd couples”

APPLICATION & DEADLINE: Please submit one PDF file containing
a 250-word abstract and a two-page CV by March 15, 2018 to bprogram[at]zedat.fu-berlin.de