Publikationen

Dieser Band enthält grundsätzliche Überlegungen und textbezogene Fallstudien zu poetologischen Potenzialen von Widersprüchen und Verwandtem in deutschen und europäischen Erzähltexten vom 12. bis zum 17. Jahrhundert. Untersucht werden Akte der Widerrede und Phänomene der Unvereinbarkeit, widersprüchliche Konzeptualisierungen und narratologische Brüche, epistemologische Bedingungen der Wahrnehmung von Widersprüchlichkeit, Aspekte einer Poetologie des Widerspruchs als Mittel der Sinnkomplexion.

Widersprüchliche Figuren sind Figuren, deren textinterne Figurenzeichnung widersprüchlich ist oder die im und als Widerspruch zu textexternen Diskursen und Traditionen entworfen sind. Der Band enthält Fallstudien von Vergil bis zum frühneuhochdeutschen Prosaroman und zur neuzeitlichen Nibelungenrezeption verbunden mit methodischen Überlegungen im Spannungsfeld von Figurennarratologie, Dialogforschung, historischer Anthropologie und Diskursanalyse. Eigenarten mittelalterlich-frühneuzeitlichen Erzählens (vor allem die Transtextualität vieler Figuren und ihre Bindung an Plot oder Script) werden darin ebenso deutlich wie die Notwendigkeit, Epochenklischees zu reflektieren. Die Beiträge laden dazu ein, Widersprüchlichkeit als figurennarratologische Kategorie weiterzudenken.

Am Beispiel Gunthers, Siegfrieds, Dietrichs von Bern und Etzels im ›Nibelungenlied‹ untersucht der Vortrag Widersprüche zwischen Königsrang und tatsächlicher Handlungsmacht, zwischen Herrscherhandeln und Herrschaftsdiskurs. Sie verweisen auf die gattungstypische Selbstdarstellung des Kriegeradels in der Heldenepik und auf den Primat von Stoffgeschichte und Finalität der Handlung gegenüber der insofern nur ›nachgeordnet‹ widersprüchlichen Figurenkonstitution, aber auch auf Verschiebungen im Herrschaftsdiskurs.

This article (re-)examines (marked) inconsistencies and incompatibilities in Middle High German heroic epic. Those contradictions may result from oral tradition, from the difficulties of transfering oral narratives into literacy, from the conditions of performing from memory, or from traditional narrative regularities of the genre. Frequently, they are striking side effects of a type of narration which is paradigmatic instead of syntagmatic, elliptic and aggregative, scenic and final, and therefore highly tolerant against contradictions of any kind. Contradictions and inconsistencies are (consciously or unconsciously) used (and imitated) as one of the constitutive stylistic features of heroic epic. In some cases, moreover, contradictions and inconsistencies are obviously part of an intentional poetics of contradiction ostentatiously accumulating and exhibiting different layers of knowledge and meaning. The textual strategies of heroic epic, in some respect perhaps of premodern narration in general, tend to favour discrepancies, contrasts, and contradiction instead of nuances, compromises, and smooth transitions.

Contradiction is not just a (post-)modern phenomenon. In premodern narratives, conflicting concepts and logical inconsistencies are omnipresent. This paper focuses on contradictions interdependent with knowledge: Traditional narratives may aggregate different versions of matters rooted in collective memory (heroic epic) or authoritative sources (romances of antiquity), sometimes without concern for the consistency of their own story. Narrative texts may use contradiction for didactic purposes. Contradictions may result in both construction and deconstruction of knowledge. Strategies of irritation and ambiguity involve recipients in the production of meaning. Thus, the concept of contradiction is apt to redefine premodern narrative strategies.

Der Beitrag skizziert Darstellung und vielfältige Funktionen ausgewählter Gegenfiguren im höfischen Roman um 1200. Vom Antikenroman abgesehen begegnen nur selten Gegenspieler auf Augenhöhe, die ein entgegengesetztes Wertsystem repräsentieren und konsequent bis zum Ende gegen den Helden agieren. Die Texte sind protagonistenzentriert; ein gleichwertiges narratives Gegenüber wird kaum entworfen. Insofern wäre der Begriff ‘Antagonist’ für Artus-, Gral- und Tristanroman zu hinterfragen.

In premodern narratives contradictions are omnipresent – conflicting concepts, logical inconsistencies, acts of objection. In a narratological perspective ›contradiction‹ – conflicts of incompatible knowledges and narrative patterns; inconsistencies in or between speech (by narrator or characters) and action; contradictory or inconsistent information and motivation – is apt to subvert, complicate, or enrich the textual production of meaning. The project ›Contradiction as a Narrative Principle in Premodern Narrative‹ (University of Bremen) explores different types of contradictions in medieval epic and romance.

This article examines the agency and incentives that drive the activism of diasporic political influencers on “Facebook Malawi,” an online imagined political community. In their seminal work on “social media dissidents” and “social media self-made activists” in the Global South, Matsilele and Sharra demonstrate that social media activists engage with different strategies to initiate movements, mobilize citizens, and create their brands in strong opposition to authoritarian regimes which repositions them as freedom fighters in the eyes of the masses and enemies of the state. Correspondingly, we frame diasporic political influencers as actors aided by digital technologies who engage in “long-distance nationalism” on Facebook against authoritarianism in the homeland. We deploy a qualitative mixed methods approach to analyze Facebook data of two diasporic political influencers, Onjezani Kenani and Manes Winnie Hale, who gave informed consent to use their Facebook data generated in 2018 and 2021, a period preceding and following the 2019 Malawi tripartite elections. A thematic analysis of 250 Facebook posts and interview data with the two influencers illustrates how they exercise their agency in their quest for a vision of a better Malawi while navigating a complex and ambivalent web of online and offline threats, incentives, and interests. Implicated in the political communication and mobilization of the two are different strategies that include verbal inventiveness, trolling, and exposing. The article also shows how the concept of long-distance nationalism needs to be adapted in studying diasporic political influencers.

Research in African Literatures, the premier journal of African literary studies worldwide, serves as a stimulating vehicle in English for research on the oral and written literatures of Africa. Reviews of current scholarly books are included in every number, and a forum offers readers the opportunity to respond to issues raised in articles and book reviews.

After explaining the rationale for bringing the author of The Old Drift, Namwali Serpell, and critical theorist Homi Bhabha into conversation, this interview with both of them explores some of the key themes of Serpell’s novel in relation to its wider geopolitical and historical context. Beginning with how we can understand the state of the planet in the present historical moment, the discussion expands to explore the broad context of more themes in the novel, which includes the place of gender and sexual politics, a global pandemic in a time of national and financial closures, cosmopolitanism, the space race and reverberations of the Cold War in the present, and the continued relevance, if any, of postcolonial theory, technology, revolution, and futurity.

Against the backdrop of general considerations of the interview as a genre, the paper discusses under which theoretical conditions interviews are suitable instruments for discourse analysis. With a special interest in questions of the linguistic constitution of shared knowledge in discourse, the authors outline the discourse-linguistic status of interviews in a systematic way.

When calculating structural or spectroscopic properties of molecular crystals, the question arises whether it is sufficient to simulate only a single molecule or a small molecular cluster or whether the simulation of the entire crystal is indispensable. In this work we juxtapose calculations on the high-pressure structural properties of the (periodic) HCN crystal and chains of HCN molecules of finite length. We find that, in most cases, the behavior of the crystal can be reproduced by computational methods simulating only around 15 molecules. The pressure-induced lengthening of the C−H bond in HCN found in calculations on both the periodic and finite material are explained in terms of orbital interaction. Our results pave the way for a more thorough understanding of high-pressure structural properties of materials and give incentives for the design of materials that expand under pressure. In addition, they shed light on the complementarity between calculations on periodic materials and systems of finite size.