Andreas Kilcher: Catalogue data in Spring Semester 2017

Name Prof. Dr. Andreas Kilcher
FieldLiterature and Cultural Studies
Address
Literatur- u. Kulturwiss., Kilcher
ETH Zürich, RZ H 1.2
Clausiusstrasse 59
8092 Zürich
SWITZERLAND
Telephone+41 44 632 79 20
E-mailakilcher@ethz.ch
DepartmentHumanities, Social and Political Sciences
RelationshipFull Professor

NumberTitleECTSHoursLecturers
851-0300-59LUniversal Science. Models of Encyclopedia Between Philosphy and Literature (1600-2000)
Information for UZH students:
Enrolment to this course unit only possible at ETH. No enrolment to module 173 at UZH.

Please mind the ETH enrolment deadlines for UZH students: Link
3 credits2SA. Kilcher
AbstractThe form of encyclopedia is central to knowledge since the modern era. It claims to embrace all phenomena of nature, history and culture and to represent this totality in a universally valid form. Despite its demand for universality the form of encyclopedia changes strongly throughout the centuries. The seminar is going to discover this development from renaissance to the present day.
Objective1) Overview of the most important encyclopedia projects from renaissance to the present; 2) theoretical understanding of different encyclopedia models; 3) comprehension of the aesthetic aspects of encyclopedia; 4) role of encyclopedic models in theory and history of the novel.
ContentThe form of encyclopedia is central to knowledge in modern era. Such knowledge claims to embrace all phenomena of nature, history and culture. Encyclopedia, in this context, is claimed to be the universal form which can describe this totality. However, if we look at the history of encyclopedia, it shows clearly that this was not at all a universally valid form. In fact, the actual form of encyclopedia changes various times: Combinative models in the 16th century were replaced in the 17th century by rational systems. In 18th and 19th century these rational systems were exchanged for alphabetic lexicons. And these lexicon got substituted for networks such as the Internet. The seminar will investigate, on the one hand, a historical approach to the changing models of encyclopedia. On the other hand, it is interested in an epistemological and poetological analysis of encyclopedic models. We will therefore focus both aesthetic aspects and the role of encyclopedia for certain literary genres, such as the novel.
LiteratureAndreas B. Kilcher: Mathesis und Poiesis. Die Enzyklopädik der Literatur 1600-2000. München: Fink 2003
851-0300-71LFantastic Literature and Occult Knowledge
Information for UZH students:
Enrolment to this course unit only possible at ETH. No enrolment to module 550cm0 and 167c at UZH.

Please mind the ETH enrolment deadlines for UZH students: Link
3 credits2VA. Kilcher
AbstractThe course focuses on the complex relation between the Fantastic and Occultism, which is understood as part of the history of knowledge of the imaginary after the 18th century.
ObjectiveThe course aims at conveying a general overview on various theoretical and literary conceptions of the Fantastic. At the same time it wishes to transmit the knowledge of occultism and its forms of representation.
ContentThe Fantastic may be understood as the conflictual surpassing of the fundamental literary function of fantasy during the modern age. Fantasy no longer structures an autonomous wonderful world, but it breaks in on the real as the imaginary. After 1800, and in the form of the imaginary, the fantastic breaks into a world that is thought to be rational and scientifically explainable while dissolving the causative correlations of the Enlightenment. In the backdrop of such tensed evolution, the Fantastic establishes itself within the context of the secularisation and of the scientification of knowledge. Yet, the Fantastic also promotes new forms of knowledge that come into conflict with the academic sciences during the 18th and 19th centuries and assert themselves as counterknowledge. This becomes evident and comprehensible in relation to occult sciences, namely theosophy, occultism, spiritism etc. With reference to the Fantastic counterknowledge becomes evident in a wide variety of distinctive images, and narratives, that relate of the uncanny, the gothic, the grotesque, the demonic, the surreal etc. At the same time, occult sciences look for the proximity to the arts of the Fantastic, that promise a new aesthetic -- as well as their possibilities in the media -- for the representation and the narration of the imaginary and the obscure.

The course has a twofold goal. It wishes to understand the notion and the history of Fantastic literature beginning with the 19th century, taking as case studies crucial and intriguing writers such as E.T.A. Hoffmann, Gustav Meyrink and Jorge Louis Borges. At the same time, the course aims at ascertaining the notion "occult knowledge" (resp. occult sciences) and its epistemological aspiration in conflict with academic knowledge. The lecture, therefore, aims at the reconstruction of the complex interrelation between the Fantastic and Occultism as a part of the history of knowledge of the imaginary right up to Psychoanalysis.
862-0002-17LResearch Colloquium History of Knowledge (FS 2017) Restricted registration - show details
Only for MAGPW students, D-GESS PHD and D-ARCH PHD students.

This colloquium is highly recommended for first and second semester MAGPW students.
2 credits1K + 1AK. M. Espahangizi, M. Hagner, H. Fischer-Tiné, D. Gugerli, A. Kilcher, P. Sarasin, P. Ursprung, L. Wingert
AbstractThe colloquium of the ZGW focuses on present developments, debates and perspectives in the field of history of knowledge.
ObjectiveThe colloquium deals with the general problems, questions and methods of the interdisciplinary research field "The history of knowledge". Knowledge has become one of the existential conditions of modern societies and it increasingly determines their dynamics. Therefore, it is getting more and more relevant to develop a differentiated analysis of the epistemic, social and cultural constraints of the production, circulation and the decay of knowledge. In addition, the colloquium asks after the cultural and ethical resonances of knowledge not only within science but also in relation to art, literature, technology, everyday life, and so on.
Prerequisites / NoticeKurzfristige Veranstaltungshinweise und Programmänderungen werden über den ZGW Newsletter kommuniziert, daher bitte auf www.zgw.ethz.ch/de/newsletter.html eintragen!

Kreditpunkte können durch regelmässige Teilnahme und die Abfassung eines Essays (o.ä.m., Umfang: 5-7 Seiten) über das Thema eines der Vorträge erworben werden. Zusätzlich zu den Kolloquiumsterminen muss an einem weiteren Termin (nach Absprache anfangs Semester) ein vertiefendes Begleitseminar besucht werden (Dozent: Kijan Espahangizi).


Es besteht die Möglichkeit zur parallelen kostenlosen Kinderbetreuung vor Ort.
862-0089-00LAdvanced Colloquium in Literary Studies Restricted registration - show details
Colloquium is designed for advanced and graduated students.
2 credits1KA. Kilcher
AbstractThe colloquium addresses advanced and graduate students. First, it offers participants the opportunity to present their own research projects (work in progress); and, second, it provides a most fruitful space to discuss methodological, theoretical and systematic complex issues.
ObjectiveThe colloquium addresses advanced and graduate students. First, it offers participants the opportunity to present their own research projects (work in progress); and, second, it provides a most fruitful space to discuss methodological, theoretical and systematic complex issues.