Anne-Kathrin Reulecke
Wired Subjects. Literature in the Technocene
Lecture
Anne-Kathrin Reulecke
Alongside the term “Anthropocene,” which refers to the age in which humans have permanently altered the geophysical system of the Earth, “Technocene” is a neologism that has become increasingly used in recent years. This notion refers to a new epoch characterized by the fact that technological developments, in the form of digitalization and artificial intelligence, are making permanent changes to our idea of the human and our realities as human beings.
In the field of literature, there is currently a boom in texts that respond to these rapid developments and the progressive intersections of subjects with media, devices and apparatuses, to the rise of algorithm-based formats and the increasing use of artificial intelligence – and do so through artistic modes of translation. On the one hand, overlaps between humans and the machine are diagnosed, depicted and reflected upon with regard to their far-reaching consequences for the individual subject, but also for social coexistence and the human condition as a whole (sometimes very critically and sometimes to a lesser extent). On the other hand, literature is used for its potential to imaginatively anticipate the consequences of current techno-scenarios and create thought experiments – often with the help of a setting in a near future.
This lecture by Anne-Kathrin Reulecke will present a selection of contemporary novels that deal with the interconnectedness of humans with technical devices and give literary form to the increasingly real coexistence of humans and human-like robots.
Artists
Participating artists
Univ.-Prof. Dr.phil Anne-Kathrin Reulecke
is a university professor of modern German literature with a focus on literary theory and the history and theory of literary aesthetics at the Institute of German Studies at the University of Graz; before that she was a research associate at the Center for Literary and Cultural Research Berlin and at the Technical University of Berlin; in 2010 she was at the Max Kade Distinguished Visiting Professor, University of Virginia, USA. Since 2023 she has been a member of the DFG network “PRANA — Posthuman Research and Narration: Posthumanist Research and Narration”; and since October 2024 spokesperson of the structured doctoral program “Transformations of the Human” at the Faculty of Humanities, University of Graz.
Further research interests: Literature and visual arts 18th to 21st century; biotechnology, medicine, media and intermediality in contemporary literature; theories of authorship, forgery and plagiarism. Book publications, most recently: Walter Benjamin and Roland Barthes. Theoretische Komparatistik zwischen Kritischer Theorie und (Post-)Strukturalismus, ed. with Anke Jaspers, Wallstein 2025; Descriptio. Potentiale literarischer Beschreibung, ed. with Kurt Hahn, Steffen Schneider, Julia Zimmermann. Rombach 2024; Speaking with the Dead. Afterlife Narratives in Contemporary Literature and Art, ed. with Johanna Zeisberg, Böhlau 2021; Sehstörungen. Grenzwerte des Visuellen in Künsten und Wissenschaften, ed. with Margarete Vöhringer, Kadmos 2019.
Anne-Kathrin Reulecke