2017
Lessing and Memory
American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS) , Minneapolis, MNMarch 30-April 2, 2017
Moderator and commentator: Nicholas Rennie, Rutgers University
1. Beate Allert, Purdue University: Three Cases of Forgetting in Lessing's Work2. Sean Franzel, University of Missouri: Koselleck's Lessing
3. William Levine, Middle Tennessee State University: Selectively Forgetting the Past and Anticipating Progressive Supersession in Lessing's Reconciliation of Rational and Intuitive Enlightenment
4. Peter Gilgen, Cornell University: Against Memory: Aristotle, Huarte, and Lessing's Theological Writings
Lessing and World Literature
Modern Language Association (MLA), Philadelphia, PAJanuary 5-8, 2017
Moderator: Monika Nenon, University of Memphis (for Saskia Ziolkowski, Duke University, organizer)
1. Thomas O. Beebee, Penn State University: The World Literary Network of Lessing's Drama Criticism2. Birgit Tautz, Bowdoin College: Lessing's (Mis-)Translations
3. Claire Baldwin, Colgate University: Navid Kermani's portrait of Lessing as cosmopolitan exemplar.
2016
Nathan Non-the-Wiser? Migration, Terrorism, and the Staging of Religious Tolerance
Lessing SocietyGerman Studies Association (GSA), San Diego, CA
September 29-October 2, 2016
Moderator: Mary Helen Dupree, Georgetown University
Commentator and Organizer: Lydia Tang, Vanderbilt University
1. Matthias Mansky, University of Vienna: Lessing-Rezeption und religiöse Toleranz: Stephanies des Jüngeren Lustspiel Die abgedankten Officiers2. Jan Kühne, Hebrew University Jerusalem: The Parable of the Three Languages: Nathan der Weise in Hebrew, Arabic, and German
3. Marcel Grissmer, Inter-Group Theater: Lessing's Philotas in Israel
4. Elisabeth Tropper, University of Luxembourg: "wie Wasser, geworfen von Klippe zu Klippe, selber zu Wasser geworden." Überlegungen zu fließenden Grenzräumen und Figuren des "Dritten" bei Elfriede Jelinek, Hans-Werner Krösinger und andcompany+Co
Precision, Correction, and Performance: Creative Process in Lessing's Works
Lessing SocietyAmerican Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS) at Pittsburgh
March 31-April 3, 2016
Chair: Pascale Lafountain (Montclair State University)
1. Henrik S. Wilberg (Wabash College / Northwestern University): "Aus der ersten Hand": Lessing's A-theology of Creation2. Ursula Rüger (University of Konstanz): Lessing's and Gerstenberg's Works on Semiotics
3. Edward T. Potter (Mississippi State University): Marwood as the Modern Medea: Creativity and the Dangers of Sentiment in Lessing's Miß Sara Sampson
Laokoon at 250
Modern Language Association (MLA) at Austin, TXJanuary 7-10, 2016
Presiding: Birger Vanwesenbeeck (State University of New York Fredonia)
Respondent: Beate Allert (Purdue University, West Lafayette)
1. Nicholas A. Rennie (Rutgers University): Recollecting the Laokoon: Memory and Forgetting as Problems of Medium2. Andrea Meyertholen (University of Kansas): Laokoon and His Sisters: The Case for Blurring Boundaries and Strengthening Bonds Between Sister Arts
3. Zachary Tavlin (University of Washington): Lessing and the Aspect Time of the Photograph
4. Jonathan Blake Fine (University of California, Irvine): Uncertain Borders: Groys, Lessing, and the Invention of Antiphilosophy
2015
Enlightenment, Theatre, and Education: Lessing's oeuvre in transcultural perspective
Lessing SocietyASECS 2015
March 19-22, 2015, Los Angeles
Coordinator: Prof. Dr. Gaby Pailer: pailer@mail.ubc.ca
Using the theatrical stage as a means of education of the people is one of the core Enlightenment ideas, in German literature prominently fostered by Lessing. From a traditional viewpoint, this has been mainly considered within the "national" development of German literature, focusing on the paradigm shift between heroic and bourgeois tragedy, and newly emerging concepts of the individual and society. The ASECS panel could instead focus on the transcultural perspective by investigating the foreign (English, French, Italian, Scandinavian et. al.) cultures of letters and theatre Lessing connects with or may be connected with in various ways, such as:- Early Enlightenment culture and the theatrical practice of transcultural adaptations - Engagement with paradigms of English and French theatre and their educational notions (e.g. comedy larmoyant, domestic tragedy)- Media changes: crossovers between epistolary novel (e.g. Richardson) and drama; visual art and drama.- Theory of tragedy and comedy, e.g. reception of Aristotle in different European Enlightenment cultures.
- Concepts of state, individual, political education, gendered education.
Universal and Particular in Lessing
Sponsored by the Lessing SocietyMLA, Vancouver, CA
January 8-11, 2015
Moderator: Seth Berk, University of Washington, Seattle
1. Birger Vanwesenbeeck, SU of New York: Laokoon and Loss2. Stephanie Chapman, University of Oregon: G.E. Lessing and the Fabulist Genre: From Mundane Abstraction to Universal Thematic
3. Saskia Ziolkowski, Duke University: Emilia Galotti as a Galeotto: Whose Go-Between?
4. Friederike von Schwerin-High, Pomona College: Universal non-universalizabilty in G.E. Lessing's "Nathan the Wise"
2014
Lessing's Laokoon and Eighteenth Century Aesthetics
Sponsored by the Lessing SocietyGerman Studies Association, Kansas City, Missouri
September 18-21, 2014
Moderator: Brian McInnis United States Military Academy, West Point
Commentator: John McCarthy Vanderbilt University
1. Martin Baeumel, University of Texas at Austin: Baumgarten's Meditations and Lessing's Laokoon: From Form to Subject2. Jessica Guesken, Technische Universität Dortmund: Telling Thersites: On a Mighty Example of the Ugly
3. Kerstin Pahl, Humboldt University Berlin / King's College London: Timing Life: Portraiture's Response to Lessing and Shaftesbury
Lessing's Translations/Translating Lessing
Lessing-Society Sponsored PanelASECS Annual Convention, Williamsburg, VA
March 20-23, 2014
Coordinator: Mary Helen Dupree (mhd33@georgetown.edu)
1. Wendy Arons, Carnegie Mellon University/Sara Figal, Tufts University/Natalya Baldyga, Tufts University: Translating (mis)translations: The "Hamburgische Dramaturgie" for an English Reader2. Johannes Schmidt, Clemson University: "Aber wer wird mit halben Augen lesen?" Bayle's Dictionnaire, Gottsched's Translation, and Lessing's Cardanus
3. Peter Erickson, University of Chicago: Adapting Christitan Tragedy for the Enlightenment Stage: Lessing, Wieland, Cronegk
2013
Lessing and Genre
German Studies Association (GSA) , Denver, ColoradoOctober 3-6 2013
Moderator: John A. McCarthy, Vanderbilt University
Commentator: Ann Schmiesing, University of Colorado-Boulder
1. Thomas Martinec, Universität Regensburg: Lessing and the Genre of the Opera.2. Charlotte Craig, Rutgers University: Lessing's Lessons in Brevity: Enlightenment, Art, and Tact in his Fables.
3. Monika Fick, RWTH Aachen: Lessings Minna von Barnhelm und die Form der Komödie.
New Approaches to the Work of Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
A Lessing Society PanelAmerican Society for Eighteenth Century Studies
Session Proposal for the 44th Annual Meeting
Cleveland Ohio, April 2-7, 2013
Organizer: Prof. Beate Allert,
Purdue University
1. Mimmi Woisnitza, University of Chicago: "Die Leiter aber ist das Mitleid". The Theatrical Media Logic of Lessing's Concept of Mitleid.2. Joseph D. Rockelmann, Purdue University: Nathan der Weise: Linking Dream with Ekphrasis.
3. Daniel Jones, Purdue University: The Ugly and the Terrible in Lessing.
4. Olga Katharina Schwarz, Freie Universität Berlin: Twofold Action: Lessing's Concept of Handlung as a Product of Contemporary Philosophical Discourse.
Panel II: Chair: Beate Allert, Purdue University
1. Jonathan Fine, University of California Irvine: What Lessing Wrought: The Impact of the Fragmentenstreit on the Development of Religious Polemic.
2. Stephen D. Martinson, University of Arizona: Lessing and Transcultural German Studies.
3. Wendy Arons, Carnegie Mellon University, sharing her publication project in process with Sara Figal, Natalya Baldyga, and Michael Chemers: A new online translation of Lessing's Hamburger Dramaturgie, which will be the first complete annotated translation of this work.
2012
The Anthropological Turn
Session Panel organized by the Lessing SocietyGerman Studies Association (GSA)
October 4-7, 2012
Moderator: Monika Nenon, University of Memphis
Commentator: Carl Niekerk, University of Illinois
Steven Martinson, University of Arizona: The Birth of Lessing's Anthropology out of the Spirit of His Christian HeritageNicole Calian, University of Washington, Seattle: Meaningless Dreams? Miss Sara Sampson against the Back-drop of its Anthropological Discourse
Brian McInnis, University of Northern Iowa: Dynamics of Observation: Anthropology in E.A. Nicolai's Gedancken von Thränen und Weinen and Literary Contexts
Charlotte Craig, Rutgers University: Interest in the Past with an Eye on the Future: Lessing's Awareness of and Contributions to the Environmental and Social Relations of His Age