News

Upcoming International Conference: Traveling Bodies Exposed: Vulnerability, Embodied Experience, and Travel Literature

The conference will take place on November 27, 2026, at Ghent University, and is organized in collaboration with the Research Center “Body Cultures in Motion (BOCULT)”. Please find the Call for Papers here.

Workshop "Migrant Mother and her Kin: Picturing Displacement in U.S. Visual Culture"

Together with Professor Karsten Fitz (University of Passau), Professor Nicole Maruo-Schröder has organized a workshop on the topic of picturing displacement in US American visual culture, which seems particularly relevant with regard to the ongoing global displacement of millions of people due to war, economic necessities, natural catastrophes, and other reasons. The workshop will take place on Friday, May 29, 2026, during the annual conference of the German Association of American Studies to be held at the University of Münster.

https://www.uni-muenster.de/Anglistik/Research/Amerikanistik/Kinship2026/Program/index.html

Summer Term 2026: Lecture Series on "Transitions and Transgressions: Fluid Gender Movements"

The lecture series, which is organized by the university's Potentialbereich III, is part of both the Certificate Gender Studies as well as the Colloquium Cultural Studies (Kulturwissenschaftliches Kolloquium) of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities. It features a series of talks from different disciplines that explore various aspects of gender constructions and how they occur in different socio-cultural contexts and are represented in music, literature, media, and the arts. On May 6, 2026, Nicole Maruo-Schröder and Uta Schaffers will talk about "Körper in Bewegung: Genderbezogene Körperdiskurse im Kontext von Reise und Reiseliteratur" (Moving Bodies: Gendered Body Discourses in Travel and Travel Literature). For the full program, please click here:

https://www.uni-koblenz.de/de/newsroom/ringvorlesung-zum-thema-fluide-geschlechterbewegungen

Work in Progress: New Publication on 'Exploring Bodies and Corporeality'

Based on the papers presented at the International Conference organized by the Research Unit in November 2025, a new publication is in preparation, which deals with the role of the body in non-fictional travel texts. The volume will be published as a special issue of the international open-access journal 'Mobile Cultural Studies', hosted by the University of Graz (https://unipub.uni-graz.at/mcsj) (25.4.2026)

New Website Launch: Koblenz Research Unit "Body • Travel • Literature"

The interdisciplinary Koblenz Research Unit, founded in 2025, is thrilled to announce the launch of its new official website. The platform serves as a central hub for international exchange and cooperation in the field of travel research and travel writing. (21.3.2026)

'DAAD-Gastdozentur' awarded to Dr. Dúnlaith Bird

Dr. Dúnlaith Bird, Université Sorbonne Paris Nord – Pléiade and member of the Research Unit 'Body • Travel • Literature' has been awarded a visiting professorship at the University of Koblenz as part of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD). (27.1.2026)

Prof. Maruo-Schröder and Prof. Schaffers become part of the new 'Potentialbereich III: Fluide Geschlechtsbewegungen' of the University of Koblenz

Prof. Dr. Nicole Maruo-Schröder and Prof. Dr. Uta Schaffers are part of one of three research topics located at the University of Koblenz , which are funded by the Landesforschungsinitiative Rhineland-Pfalz (the research initiative of Rhineland-Palatinate that funds projects that are particularly promising). The so-called Potentialbereich III explores "Transitions and Transgressions: Fluid Gender Movements" ('Transition und Transgression: Fluide Geschlechterbewegungen'). (1.11.2025)