Events Calendar

Rodig Lecture: Elisabeth Strowick (NYU)
Thursday, November 15, 2018, 04:30pm - 06:00pm

Please join us for the
Fall 2018 Rodig Lecture

given by Elisabeth Strowick, New York University

 

Scenes of Force: Freud, Stifter, Austin

In a constellative reading of literature, psychoanalysis, and speech act theory, my lecture develops a notion of the scenic, which profiles the scene as the site of force [Schauplatz von Kraft]. Scenic force is evident in the proliferation of the writing- and castle-complex in Stifter's Narrenburg, as “Spannung” (tension, suspense) in the dream of Freud's Wolfman, as “sea-change” in Austin's exclusion of literary-theatrical speech acts. Here, force is understood decidedly in terms of representation theory, as a force of representation that asserts itself as a scenic force. Distinct from notions of the scene that are oriented towards unity, closure, and stability, the dynamics of scenic force analyzed here introduce a thinking of the scenic to figures of seriality, belatedness, suspense, and doubling, as well as the spectral scene effects which result from them.

 

 

This program is funded by a generous annual gift from Mrs. Lillian Rodig Maxwell, in memory of her brother, Dr. Oscar R. Rodig, Jr. RC ‘51, who studied Chemistry and German at Rutgers College, and in memory of her sister Erika Rodig Rosera, DC ‘62, who studied History and German at Douglass College.

Location Comparative Literature Seminar Room, AB 4052