Digital Kafka Symposium, Georgetown University & Online
Digital Kafka Symposium, Georgetown University, 1-2 November 2024
Franz Kafka’s oeuvre has been examined countless times in the past—mostly in the form of articles and contributions to books and edited volumes. As his works have been available in the digital realm for quite some time now, this symposium aims to focus on research, teaching, and creative approaches that either make use of digital tools to analyze Kafka’s work or use digital platforms to share and disseminate parts of Kafka’s oeuvre and its analyses. The 100th anniversary of Kafka’s death in 2024 seems to be an apt moment to look at digital approaches to his texts that build on the affordances of Digital Humanities, which has become an established area of scholarly activity in the past decades.
- What can digital approaches reveal about Kafka’s writings and drawings? How do these analyses change or extend existing scholarship?
- How can digital tools be useful for creative approaches to Kafka’s works? How can the materiality of Kafka’s oeuvre be preserved in the digital realm?
- How can digital approaches enhance teaching Kafka’s texts? What are the advantages and disadvantages of teaching his writings using digital platforms?
- What role do the archives and institutions that hold Kafka’s work play in offering and disseminating his works digitally?
This two-day symposium brings together researchers from the institutions that hold Kafka’s oeuvre with scholars, teachers, creators, and digital scholarship specialists to discuss and exchange details about current digital approaches to Franz Kafka’s works.
Symposium Location:
Georgetown University, Washington, DC & Online
Healy Hall room 104 and Intercultural Center (ICC) room 462
To attend in person, please register here for Friday, November 1.
Please register here for Saturday, November 2.
This will be a hybrid event. To receive a Zoom link, please register here.
This event is supported by Georgetown University’s German Department and the DAAD Grant “Promoting German and European Studies in North America (PGES).”
Program:
Friday, November 1
11:30 Registration – German Department, Intercultural Center (ICC 462)
12:00 Welcome & Lunch (ICC 462)
Panel 1: 1:30pm – 3:30pm (Healy Hall room 104)
Digital Kafka – In Institutions, Archives, and Museums
Carolin Duttlinger (University of Oxford, Co-Director of the Oxford Kafka Research Centre)
Kafka’s Communities - Real and Virtual
Laura Friedrichsohn (Deutsches Literaturarchiv Marbach)
“Wollen Sie nicht näher kommen und sich die Nadeln ansehen?” Dialectical ‘Contemplations’ on Kafka’s Writing
Coffee Break: 3:30pm – 4:00pm (Healy Hall first floor)
Panel 2: 4:00pm – 5:45pm (Healy Hall room 104)
Digital Analyses and Databases: Kafka’s The Trial and The Metamorphosis
Verena Kick (Georgetown University) & Carsten Strathausen, Ben Mahurin, Andrei Kazakov (University of Missouri)
Adapting Kafka – Overview, Kafka Core, Stylometry
Matt Erlin (Washington University in St. Louis)
Gregor’s Metamorphoses: Kafka Translation at Scale
6:00 pm Dinner (Healy Hall first floor)
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Saturday, November 2
8:30am – 9:30am Breakfast (Healy Hall first floor)
Panel 3: 9:30am – 12:00pm (Healy Hall room 104)
Kafka Caught In Between: Analogue Materials, Digital Editions, and YouTube Videos
Rolf Goebel (University of Alabama in Huntsville)
Kafka’s Artificial Intelligence Scenarios: Audiovisual Spectacles for the Digital Age
Kiyoko Myojo (Seijo University & University of Oxford) & Yasuhiro Sakamoto (Shinshu University)
Introducing the “Myojo-Sakamoto Model:” A Novel Application of Deep Learning and Generative AI in Reconstructing the Writing Chronology of Kafka’s Manuscripts
Christian Marchlewitz (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
The Real Thing, but Digital? Kafka’s Letters - A Report from the Archive
Ekkehard Haring (Bundesinstitut für Kultur und Geschichte des östlichen Europa, Oldenburg)
On the Road with Kafka-Atlas – A Project for Mapping the Worldwide Reception
Lunch: 12:00pm – 1:30pm (Healy Hall first floor)
Panel 4: 1:30pm – 4:00pm (Healy Hall room 104)
Gamifying Kafka – Between Virtual Reality and Artificial Intelligence
Ahlam Bavi (University of Regina) & Megan Smith (University of British Columbia)
Exploring Franz Kafka’s "The Metamorphosis" through Mixed Reality: Transformative Experiences in the Digital Realm
Jessica Kathmann (Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien)
Kafka or Not? Concept for a Multi-Touch Tabletop Game for Literature Classes
Martin Sheehan (Tennessee Tech University)
From Papers to Pixels: Kafka’s Office Life and the Procedural Rhetoric of Videogames
Paul Buchholz (Emory University)
Franz Kafka as a Teacher of Digital Game Design
4:00pm Concluding Remarks
Coffee Break: 4:00pm – 4:30pm (Healy Hall first floor)
6:30pm Dinner for Presenters
Contact Information
Verena Kick
Georgetown University
Contact Email
vk275@georgetown.edu