Guest Lecture: "Gender, Race, Reproduction – and Vampires? Interrogating Reproductive Ideologies in Octavia E. Butler’s Fledgling"
JProf.' Dr.' Judith Rauscher
American Literature and Culture
"In the humanities, [...] we are always engaged in illuminating the present by drawing on the past;
it is the only way to make a future worth hoping for.” (Kwame Anthony Appiah)
"The classroom, with all its limitations, remains a location of possibility." (bell hooks)

Welcome to the website of JProf. Dr. Judith Rauscher and her team!
Judith Rauscher is assistant professor (Juniorpofessorin) of American literature and culture at the University of Cologne.
You can find more information on upcoming and past events, current research projects, teaching activities, module and final exams as well as general study information below.
Main Research Areas
- Literature, Culture, and the Environment
- Speculative Fiction, Film, and TV
- Mobility Studies, Violence Studies
- American Poetry
- Gender & Queer Studies
Upcoming and Recent Events
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Guest Lecture: "Golden Age TV Series and Fan Commentary Podcasts"
Guest Lecture by Anne Korfmacher (U of Cologne) organized as part of the seminar "New Golden Age TV: Crimes and Other Disasters"
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Guest Lecture: "Canadian Childhoods in the 19th Century"
Guest Lecture by Catherine Larochelle (U of Montréal) organized as part of the seminar "American Childhoods Through Literature and Culture"
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Guest Lecture: "Erasure as Creative Poetry Writing"
Guest Lecture by Prof. David Caplan (Dedman College) organized as part of the seminar "Poetry of Erasure: Theory and Practice"
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Info Event: Graduate Studies in the US
Info event about graduate study opportunities at the University of Rochester and program offered by the VDAC
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Guest Lecture: "Theorizing Black Anthroposcreens"
During this guest lecture, Prof. Julia Leyda (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) will explore the TV series 'Queen Sugar' and the movie 'Black Panther' from an ecocritical perspective.
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Guest Lecture: "From Pulp to Carol: In/Visibile Histories and Queer Nostalgia"
During this guest lecture, Dr. Katrin Horn (University of Bayreuth) will explore nostalgic evocations of queer pasts by discussing recent movies such as Todd Haynes 'Carol' (2015) in relation to their mid-century pulp sources.
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Guest Lecture: "Emily Dickinson and War Poetry"
During this guest lecture, Prof. Dr. Colleen Boggs (Dartmouth College) will situate Emily Dickinson's poetry about war in the larger context of US American poetry about the Civil War. For more information, please contact american-studies[at]uni-koeln.de.
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Guest Lecture: "Queer Aging: The (In)Visibility of Older Queer Women in Suzette Mayr's 'The Widows'"
During this guest lecture, Dr. Linda Hess (University of Augsburg) will discuss the intersections of queer studies and aging studies and representations in North American Culture of older queer women using as an example the novel 'The Widows' (1996) by Canadian author Suzette Mayr. For more information, please contact american-studies[at]uni-koeln.de.
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Teach-In #2: Re-Reading bell hooks
During this online event, five scholars will discuss the work of the late Black feminist, scholar, activist, and teacher bell hooks. For more information, please contact american-studies[at]uni-koeln.de.
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Poetry Reading and Workshop with Dr. Laura Passin
During this online event, queer feminist American poet Laura Passin will read from her new collection 'Borrowing Your Body' and discuss her creative practice with the audience and students of her creative writing workshop.
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“‘Rise Up’: Class Conflict and Neoliberal Speculative Survival in The Walking Dead”
Guest Lecture by Maxi Albrecht (JFKI, HU Berlin) organized as part of the seminar "Masses, Classes, and the State in American Culture"
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"Ecomedia Writing: Local Practices, Transnational Conversations"
Workshop organized by Verena Wurth (U of Cologne) and Dr. Stephen Rust (U of Oregon)