13 is your lucky number? Become part of KWI’s 13th International Fellowship cohort and apply by 28 Feb 2026! We invite #Postdoc scholars in the #humanities, #socialsciences, or #culturalstudies to join us at KWI from 1 Oct 26 until 31 Mar 27. 📢 Call: www.kulturwissenschaften.de/wp-content/u...

on the visual representations of parliamentarism in Europe (in French & German) kgparl.de/tagung-visue...

I answered some questions about my #research for @unibonn.bsky.social, so now this short #interview exists: www.uni-bonn.de/en/news/in-t... (German version below) Thanks, as always, to the @humboldt-foundation.de for the support! #postdoc #complit #bureaucraticfiction #sciencecommunication

soon in Heidelberg, on the last talk for the project this conference season! 🍂

#Conference ARCHITECTURE AND BUREAUCRACY As part of the FWF project ‘Invisible Agents’, the conference is convened by the IHB and the Institute of Art History at CAS and will take place on 6 and 7 November 2025 at the PSK-Building, 1010 Vienna. See more ⬇️ www.oeaw.ac.at/ihb/detail/e...

#KWIonTour: @schalkewins.bsky.social & @awierzock.bsky.social are giving presentations at the workshop “Temporary Intensities. Ephemeral Media, Practices, and Archives” @unituebingen.bsky.social. Also participating: our ex-fellows @alexandrairim.bsky.social & Ádám Havas. ✨ 🔗 tinyurl.com/4kavv67d

next week in Tübingen, looking at ephemeral media, practices, and archives with @schalkewins.bsky.social, @awierzock.bsky.social, @takapp.bsky.social & her emerging research network on ephemeral epistemologies and encounters www.ephemeralnetwork.com

the fun begins tomorrow — grateful to everyone involved, I couldn't have made it happen without you!

I guess now's as good a time as there will ever be to unearth an article I wrote about Krazsnahorkai's and Tarr's Sátántangó before it was cool. Then again, it's always been cool. #Nobel #Krasznahorkai #Satantango www.ekphrasisjournal.ro/docs/R1/20E1...

Jonathan and I wrote about the fantasy of total efficiency, algorithmic governance, and the bureaucratic horror story as a recurring fictional trope — thank you, KWI Blog team, for hosting the piece!

next week at the University of Cologne we're looking at how literature engages with Niklas Luhmann's concept of organizational "boundary roles"

Bureaucritics #5 is now online! It brings along a busy stretch of new publications, from the just-printed to the just-planned, plus fresh calls for papers and events.

The international #symposium Files, Forms, Fictions is turning into a real thing! Browse through the full program and learn more about the event at filesformsfictions.com. Thank you, @humboldt-foundation.de & @unibonn.bsky.social, for all your support! #bureaucraticfiction #comparativeliterature

"Jenkin-Smith brings to his readers’ attention authors and periodicals that literary histories have meanwhile discarded or longtime ignored." Alexandra Irimia on Daniel Jenkin-Smith's The Rise of Office Literature, from @bloomsburybooksus.bsky.social: criticalinquiry.uchicago.edu/alexandra_ir...

ACLA Seminar on the Objectification of Office Workers, co-organized with Karolin Schäfer Feb 26 - Mar 1, 2026, Montreal Submissions (abstracts max. 1500 characters, bios max. 500) are open on the ACLA platform by Oct 2. Accepted seminars notified by Dec. 2. www.acla.org/seminar/3ebf...

Just published in Critical Inquiry: my review of @dcjenkin-smith.bsky.social’s book "The Rise of Office Literature"—a most pleasant read that gave me a lot to think with. Thanks for the review copy, @bloomsburybooksuk.bsky.social! criticalinquiry.uchicago.edu/alexandra_ir...

Bureaucratic Modernism is curious to hear your ideas! DL: Nov 15📩 Full call here: call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/08/... @moderniststudies.bsky.social @fimassociation.bsky.social @modernism-asia.bsky.social @modernistudies.bsky.social @mmodernity.bsky.social

We've just hit "Publish" on Bureaucritics #4!📬 Check out our summer dispatch on the latest in bureaucracy studies, and don't forget to subscribe if you're so inclined.

Snippets of West German bureaucracy from the 1970s. [gelatin silver prints from the exhibition Jupp Darchinger: The Eye of the Republic [Das Auge der Republik], LVR-Landesmuseum, open June 12 - September 14, 2025]

The French fascination for the curious life and paper forms of bureaucracy endures. Here, screenshots from Messieurs les ronds-de-cuir (Henri Diamant-Berger, 1959), one of 4 film adaptations of Georges Courteline's 1893 eponymous novel. #bureaucraticfiction #officenovel #bureaucratcomedy

It's only fitting that a special issue about administrative aesthetics comes out with some delay. Vol. 8 of Administory - co-edited with Jonathan Foster, Burkhardt Wolf, and Stefan Nellen is now published in Open Access! Find our intro and 17 fantastic contributions here: sciendo.com/issue/ADHI/8/1

I finished my guest lecture at Uni Konstanz and walked away with an unexpected gift. It will stay on my desk for a while. Plus: a sharp audience, good conversations, most useful feedback. Thanks to all involved, it's truly been a pleasure!

Stellenausschreibung: Für das Archiv des Fritz-Hüser-Instituts für Literatur und Kunst der Arbeitswelt suchen wir eine:n Archivar:in in Vollzeit, unbefristet, TVöD 11. Bitte teilen und an Interessierte weiterleiten, die gern in einem tollen im Team arbeiten wollen. #Stellenausschreibung #Archiv

Thank you, GCSC - International Graduate Centre for the Study of Culture @jlugiessen.bsky.social, for a fantastic on conference on Acts of Writing: Cultural Practices, Knowledge Construction, Authorship! It was nice meeting you and hearing about so many fascinating research projects in the making.

Die Akte/n. Hg. v. Peter Plener & Burkhardt Wolf. Heidelberg, Berlin: Metzler (Print) & Springer Nature (online, Open Access) 2025. link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

#Italian #bureaucratic #fiction Dr. Ciro Amendola (a pun on "Mr. Amendment") is no ordinary civil servant. As director of Italy’s Gazzetta Ufficiale—the nation’s official law journal—he stands at the critical junction where legislation becomes reality.

Fantastic panel on impersonality in literature and the arts yesterday, at the annual meeting of the American Comparative Literature Association. A huge thanks to everyone involved! #acla #acla2025 #impersonality #bureaucraticmodernism #bureaucraticfiction #comparativeliterature #complit

Had a great time last week in Vienna, at the Bureaugraphies workshop on cultures of protocol. I talked about Habsburg protocols and wartime bureaucracy records in "Forest of the Hanged". More about the project, here: bureaugraphies.univie.ac.at?page_id=22

My first article in Scena9 (in Romanian, but easily translatable in your browser), on the populist instrumentation of anti-bureaucratic sentiment in the context of the presidential elections coming up this weekend. www.scena9.ro/article/biro...

Romania's December elections have now been officially un-un-cancelled, after today's higher court cancelled yesterday's surprise cancellation of the initial cancellation. Follow us for more electoral thrills and judicial ping-pong 🍿

An interesting piece by Sage Anderson on writing without end, for the KWI Blog @kwi-essen.bsky.social blog.kulturwissenschaften.de/self-limitin...

a talented friend published a moving book review on Lit Hub lithub.com/a-literary-d...

Are you a researcher in Germany and would like to get a postdoc position abroad or go on a sabbatical? This fellowship finances your research stay with members of the Humboldt Network abroad for 6 to 24 months, up to 12 years after you completed your PhD! www.humboldt-foundation.de/en/connect/i...

happy to be part of this colorful lecture series on pop culture and pop literature, coming up in the summer semester at the University of Bonn ✨

#OutNow – Former KWI International Fellow L. Sasha Gora published her first book!✨ Blending food studies with environmental history, "Culinary Claims" examines how cuisines reflect social and political issues related to cultural representation, restaurants, and food sovereignty. shorturl.at/luGPK

already ordered a copy for the university library, can't wait to get hold of it!

The 3rd issue of #Bureaucritics is out! From groundbreaking monographs to provocative exhibitions, this issue compiles scholarship and art engaging with administration that caught our eye in 2024 (some of it coming up in 2025). Read / subscribe here: bureaucritics.substack.com/p/latest-in-...

I'm thrilled and honored to share that my book received the First Book Subvention Prize from the International Comparative Literature Association! My thanks go to the ICLA jury and, as always, to everyone who's engaged with the work. www.ailc-icla.org/ecare-first-...

Advanced international scholars in the #socialsciences and #humanities with an excellent #research profile are invited to apply until 25 May 2025 for a research #fellowship starting in 2026. Learn more about the application: www.college-uaruhr.de/.../call-for...

"[...] one follows the others stick in hand triumphant to disaster" — William Carlos Williams, "Parable of the Blind", Pictures from Brueghel (1962) [Pieter Brueghel, The Parable of the Blind (1568), Museo e Gallerie Nazionali de Capodimonte, Naples]

note to self: watch more films by Matthew Rankin (Wes Anderson meets Roy Andersson in a Winnipeg Tim Hortons)

We've just released the second issue of Bureaucritics! 📨📬 David Graeber famously labelled bureaucracy "a dead zone of the imagination" (2012). Then why are there so many artworks about it? Find out in our report on recent work on bureaucracy in the arts. bureaucritics.substack.com/p/artministr...

Instant dopamine hit at the news of this publication!📖 Many thanks to @vhoeving.bsky.social and @lenawetenkamp.bsky.social for the elegant editorial work and the invitation to contribute. Can't wait to read the other chapters! Check it out, maybe recommend it to your university library? 🙌

“Consider, Milena, that the office is not just some arbitrary, stupid institution (although it is and very much so, but that’s not the point; as a matter of fact it’s more fantastic than stupid)” Prague, July 31, 1920 [Franz Kafka, Letters to Milena, translated by Philip Boehm]

Thanks for the surprise welcome package, Humboldt Foundation! It's nice to be on board.

"Landscape with scholars" - China, Ming dynasty, 17th century, Museum für Ostasiatische Kunst — the scholar, this strange animal in the wild

Grants for literary translations, residences, projects, and festivals in Southeast Europe traduki.eu/grants/

The world was clearly missing a place to gather research on bureaucracy in arts and humanities, so Jonathan Foster and I almost learned how to use Substack and came up with a newsletter. bureaucritics.substack.com/p/best-of-bu...