Visiting Professor 2023

The Centre for Canadian Studies (ZKS) is delighted to announce that Prof. Chris Lee (University of British Columbia, Vancouver) will act as ZKS Visiting Professor in the upcoming summer term. Chris Lee is Associate Professor in the Department of English Language and Literatures and Director of the Asian Canadian and Asian Migration Studies Program at the University of British Columbia. He is the author of The Semblance of Identity: Aesthetic Mediation in Asian American Literature (Stanford University Press, 2012), which received the literary criticism book award from the Association for Asian American Studies, and a co-editor (with Maia Joseph, Christine Kim, and Larissa Lai) of Tracing the Lines: Reflections on Cultural Politics in Honour of Roy Miki (Talonbooks, 2013). He has edited special issues of Canadian Literature (with Christine Kim) and Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas (with Glenn Deer and Marissa Largo) on Asian Canadian cultural studies, and he recently co-edited a special issue of American Quarterly (with Melani McAlister) titled “From Anarchy to Chaos: Generations of Empire.” His current research focuses on historical narratives of Chinese migration to Canada, racial capitalism and Asian migrations, histories of Asian Canadian cultural activism, and diaspora Chinese literary thought during the Cold War. He received a Killam Research Prize in 2015.
Prof. Lee will offer two seminars for master students of English:
- Narrating Asian Families in North America (LIT 801 / ELM 301 / NAS 301 / NAS 302)
(Blockseminar: 16.6., 17.6., 23.6., 24.6., 9-16h; introductory zoom session on 28.4., 9-10 am)
(For your information: Porta still shows “NN” as lecturer – do not be irritated, the seminar is offered by Prof. Lee)
This course examines how Asian families in Canada and the United States have been portrayed in literature, film, media, and cultural criticism. We start by looking at how families were affected by racist immigration legislation in effect from roughly the mid-19th century to the mid-20th century. We will then consider how mid-century immigration reforms altered the conditions of family life and conclude by considering alternative formations of kinship such as adoption and queer kinship.
- Asian Canadian Literature and Culture (LIT 801 / ELM 402 / NAS 402 / NAS 403)
(together with Prof. Ralf Hertel, thursdays, 10-12 am.)
This seminar proposes to explore the field of Asian Canadian Literature and Culture by a close reading of selected texts, such as Wayson Choy’s The Jade Peony and short stories by Madeleine Thien and others. In addition, we will ask how Asian Canadian culture manifests itself in other media, for instance in TV series such as Kim’s Convenience.
There are still places available in both seminars –register now via Porta.
Gastprofessur/ Visiting Professor 2022

Gilles Dupuis, a specialist in French and French-Canadian modern novel, will be joining Trier University as a visiting professor from the 1st of May until the 31st of July. He is full professor at the French Department of the University of Montreal and recently the co-director of the Interuniversitary Research Centre on Québécois Literature and Culture (CRILCQ). His research projects focus mainly on migrant writing, parody and pastiche. He is the author of a monograph entitled Le Cycle des reincarnations. L’œuvre transmigramte de Ying Chen (Classiques Garnier, 2021) and co-editor of a series of four volumes: À la carte. Le roman québécois (Peter Lang, 2007, 2011, 2017, 2021). He also co-edited Italie-Québec. Croisements et coïncidences littéraires (Nota bene, 2009), Transmédiations.Traversées culturelles de la modernité tardive (PUM, 2012), Présences, résurgences et oublis du religieux dans les littératures française et québécoise (Peter Lang, 2017), and Avec ou sans Partipris. Le legs d’une revue (Nota bene, 2018). He published several articles in peer reviews and collective works, and gave numerous lectures as keynote or guest speaker at international conferences organized in Canada, the United-States, Europe (France, Italy, Germany, Austria, Spain, Greece, Poland, Sweden and the Netherlands), and Asia (South-Korea, Japan and China). He is an active member of the CIÉF (Conseil International d’Études Francophones), the ACQS (American Council for Québec Studies) and the AIÉQ (Association internationale d’études québécoises). His own projects on migrant and transmigrant writing, as well as parody and pastiche, have been funded by the FRQSC (Québec) and SSHRC (Canada). He is also a founder and regular member of the International Research Training Group (IRTG) on Diversity funded by the SSHRC and the DFG in Germany.
Gilles will be co-teaching a seminar on "Asian Canadian Literature: French and English Texts" with Ralf Hertel in the upcoming summer term.
Final Visiting Professor in Summer Semester 2018: Eleanor Ty (WLU)

The Centre for Canadian Studies is pleased to welcome Professor Eleanor Ty from Wilfrid Laurier University (WLU) as a Visiting Professor for the summer semester 2018.
Eleanor Ty is among Canada's most renowned literary scholars. Her essay collection Asian Canadian Writing Beyond Autoethnography (2008), co-edited with Christl Verduyn, is already a classic for studies of Asian Canadian literature. Her latest work, Asianfail: Narratives of Disenchantment and the Model Minority (2017) addresses how a new generation of Asian Canadians and Americans deal through literature with the expectations of their parents. In addition to her focus on Asian Canadian and Asian American literature and culture, Eleanor Ty explores themes of race, ethnicity, and immigration; gender and feminism; and 18th-century British women's literature. BBC dramas and Netflix series are also part of her research area.
At Trier University, she will teach two courses on "Canadian Diversity" and "Canadian Graphic Novels." She is also involved in the conference Failures East West - Scheitern zwischen Ost und West.
More about Eleanor Ty's biography, her courses, and her publications can be found on her homepage: https://www.wlu.ca/academics/faculties/faculty-of-arts/faculty-profiles/eleanor-ty/index.html.
Gastprofessur/ Visiting Professors 2018
The Canadian Studies Centre welcomes Prof. Stephan Jaeger and Prof. Priya S. Mani from January to June 2018.
Stephan Jaeger is Professor of German Studies and Head of the Department of German and Slavic Studies at the University of Manitoba. He researches on narratives, representations and memory of war in German and European literature, film, historiography, and museums.
Priya S. Mani is Professor for Psychological Counselling at the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba. Her focus is on international and transnational questions.