Article,
American Studies as Media and Visual Culture Studies: Observations on a Revitalized Research Tradition
Amerikastudien / American Studies, 57 (1): 115--128 (2012)
Abstract
This essay explores the development of media and visual culture studies in the larger context of American Studies in Germany. Even though research on media related topics and on visuality has proliferated in the past two decades, I argue there is need for further discussion about its place and practice within American Studies. In the following remarks I touch upon questions of institutional networks, the relation between the concept of culture and media technologies, canon revisions, the pedagogy of media and visual culture topics, and the competing claims of empirical and interpretative approaches. I wish to suggest that further theoretical and methodological debate could strengthen and diversify the growing interest in visual and media studies.
