Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Gender as a Category of Knowledge

Dr. Kathleen Heft

PhD Project:

Emancipated Partners, Bad Mothers, Murderous Mothers ? German Hegemonic Culture of in Light of the ›East German Other‹

 Heft
 

Description of the Project

 

How are gender norms and images in reunified Germany negotiated under the terminology of ›East‹ and ›West‹? What gender knowledge is (re) produced as normal or abnormal along this line of differentiation ? My PhD project is positioned both in cultural studies and gender studies. I conduct a qualitative discourse analysis in order to investigate preconditions and changes in media discourse, which links gender issues with discourse on East and West Germanness since 1989/90. My key research interests concern first the constitutive role of a differentiation between East and West Germanness for hegemonic gender knowledge in Germany, and second, possible connections of this specific gendered East-West differentiation with established discourse on Eastern Europe. My empirical data includes examples from German-language media coverage on topics like maternal filicide, (uncaring) motherhood, and relationships
                                                         

Particulars

 

Kathleen Heft holds a degree in cultural studies from European University Viadrina, Frankfurt (Oder). She received a scholarship from the DFG research training group “Gender as a Category of Knowledge” (2009-2012) and a completion grant from the Caroline von Humboldt Grant Programme.
   

Selected Publications

 

Heft, Kathleen (2013): Kindsmord als Phänomen Ostdeutschlands? Eine Analyse medialer Diskursverschiebungen. In: Lee, Hyunseon/Maurer Queipo, Isabel (Hg.): Mörderinnen. Künstlerische und mediale Inszenierungen weiblicher Verbrechen. Bielefeld. transcript Verlag


Heft, Kathleen (2015): Der Osten Deutschlands als (negative) Avantgarde. Vom Kommunismus im Anti-Genderismus. In: Hark, Sabine und Paula-Irene Villa (Hrsg.): (Anti-)Genderismus. Sexualität und Geschlecht als Schauplätze aktueller politischer Auseinandersetzungen. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 183-200.

 

Heft, Kathleen (2018): Brauner Osten – Überlegungen zu einem populären Deutungsmuster ostdeutscher Andersheit. Feministische Studien, 36(2), 357-366.

 

Heft, Kathleen (2020): Kindsmord in den Medien. Eine Diskursanalyse ost-westdeutscher Dominanzverhältnisse. Opladen u.a.: Budrich Academic Press.
   

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