The German Research seminar has this last year run three times per term bringing together colleagues from across the German Sub-Faculty also with gust from other Faculties e.g. History. It’s a lively and friendly forum in which colleagues ECRs and graduate students have come together to hear more about each other's work. In the past we’ve covered topics such as Walter Benjamin's networks, Environmental and Non-human Romanticisms, Knowledge and Knowedge Transfer in Pre-modern Literature, Decolonizing German Literature. We usually have at least one external speaker at term and a number of presentations from current PGR students/ECR members. At the moment we are rethinking this model for the future.
Thursday, 15 October 2026 at 2pm in the Platnauer Room, Brasenose College
Joanna Neilly (Oxford)
Usurping Maternity in E.T.A. Hoffmann’s Nachtstücke
This paper will consider Hoffmann's sustained attention to, and critique of, power dynamics by identifying a striking example of the abuse of power in his collection Nachtstücke. My focus is on the very young: newborn babies and infants, as well as on their biological mothers. Across the collection, five newborns arrive. Each of them faces mortal danger, and three of them are forcibly removed from the care of their mothers while still nursing. The aggressor is usually the father or another male relation. The paper thus examines this attempted paternal usurpation of maternity, and what this does to mother and child, as well as what it means for Hoffmann’s narrative schemes. Finally, I will also reflect on what Hoffmann has to say about contemporary views on how to care for the very young, including the legal position in the nineteenth century, and how this might resonate with current developments in child psychology.
Joanna Neilly is Associate Professor of German at the University of Oxford and Tutorial Fellow of St Peter's College. She has broad interests in German Romanticism and its afterlives. Her forthcoming publications are E. T. A. Hoffmann in Context, edited with Polly Dickson, which will be published with Cambridge University Press in March, and a new translation and edition of Hoffmann's Night Pieces, which will be published in Oxford's Worlds Classics series next year.
Thursday 12 November 2026 at 2pm in the Platnauer Room, Brasenose College
Michael Szurawitzki (Regensburg)
AI, Future and Frontiers of Translation in Computer-Mediated Communication: WeChat, Emojis, and Beyond
As Artificial Intelligence (AI) penetrates digital communication, the question arises as to whether translation as a traditional means of fostering intercultural understanding ceases to exist. AI has its own ways of shaping translations, including, emojis, sometimes actively becoming an author, depending on the platform. The talk addresses what live translation and emoji translation look like and will possibly look like in the future, using the following structure: after an introduction (1.), with a focus on China and the rapidly evolving application WeChat, the current state of research on WeChat, translation, and emojis is addressed (2.). Shifting to the first main part, we look at WeChat’s features, focusing on the translation tools and its capabilities (3.), with the yet to be researched Live Translation being the most recent addition, and put them to the test. In the second main part, we raise the question of whether there are emojis that are translatable at all and draw on a specific set of emojis to back up our argumentation (4.). The concluding remarks focus on possible future developments in digital communication and the relevant research.
Structure of the Talk
1. Introduction, 2. Previous and Current Selected Research, 3. WeChat and Live Translation – The Future of Intercultural Chat Communication?, 4. To Translate or Not to Be Translated? On the Challenges of Translating Emojis, 5. Perspectives for the Future and Further Research
Michael Szurawitzki is Professor and Interim Head of Deutsch als Fremdsprachenphilologie (German as Foreign Language) at the Universität Regensburg. Previous appointments led him to the University of California (Irvine) and to Tongji University in Shanghai, to the Beijing Institute of Technology, and universities in Munich, Hamburg, and Duisburg-Essen.
Any questions? Please email: bernhard.malkmus@new.ox.ac.uk