Eva-Sabine Zehelein received a residential fellowship (Fondation Brocher) for spring 2024. 

Courses taught at the JFKI

Summer 2024

Lecturer, B.A. Course, Introduction to Literary Studies II, Thursdays, 12-14, room 201

Lecturer, B.A. Course, Family Matters in American Fiction, 19th Century to the Present, Wednesdays, 10-12, room 201

Lecturer, M.A. Course,  Narratives of Home in North American Literatures, Wednesdays, 14-16, room 201

Lecturer, GSNAS /M.A. Course, Research Colloquium Literature/Culture, Wednesdays, 18-12, room 201

Research Interests:

• North American Literatures
• North American (Popular) Cultures
• Canadian Studies
• Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies
• Medical Humanities – ethics and aesthetics of narratives of biomedicalization
• (Sub)Urban Studies –space, race, class, and reproductive justice
• Environmental Humanities
• Visual cultures, esp. North American painting and photography
• Intermediality

Books

Science: Dramatic. Science Plays in America and Great Britain, 1990-2007. Heidelberg: Winter, 2009.

“Space as Symbol:” John Updike’s “Country of Ideas” in den Rabbit-Romanen. Essen: Blaue Eule, 2003

Edited Volumes

Joan Didion: Life and/with/through Words. co-edited with Cinzia Scarpino. Peter Lang,
September 2023.

Family in Crisis? Crossing Borders, Crossing Narratives, edited with Andrea Carosso and Aida
Rosende-Pérez. Bielefeld: Transcript, August 2020.

“Family and the Media: Cultural Politics and Public Narratives.” International Journal of Media
& Cultural Politics 15.2 (June 2019), guest edited with Tetiana Havlin and
Andrea Carosso. Online version:
 https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/mcp/2019/00000015/00000002;
jsessionid=3pmsd9rs5b2jh.x-ic-live-01.

“Family Matters 2.0: Literary and Cultural Representations of the American Family in Transition.” 
CoSMo – Comparative Studies in Modernism 12 (Spring 2018), guest edited with Andrea Carosso.
 http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/COSMO/issue/view/272.

For (Dear) Life: Close readings of Alice Munro’s Ultimate Fiction. Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2014.

Articles and Chapters

“Going, going…gone”? Of auctions and abandonments” in: Scarpino and Zehelein,
Joan Didion: Life and/with/through Words. Berlin: Peter Lang, 2023; 161-181.

“’Science is Incredible’: Performing Bodies, Searching for Identities.” Amaral, da Cruz, Montenegro et al.,
Theatre about Science. Theory and Practice. Olhares – Estudios Artisticos, Coimbra UP, 2023; 39-52

“’MI I PL ET RIUM’: Navigating a Post-Apocalyptic world in Karen Russell’s ‘The Gondoliers’”
Iperstoria: Journal of American and English Studies 19 (2022), special issue zu “Coastlines,
Oceans and Rivers of North America: Encounter and Ecocrises,” Hrsg. Andrea Carosso,
Sonia Di Loreto; 129-46. https://iperstoria.it/

“Family Trees – mnemonics, genealogy, identity and cultural memory.” Daniela Fargione, Carmen
Concilio, eds., Trees in Literatures and the Arts: Humanarboreal Perspectives in the Anthropocene. 
Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2021; 263-79.

“Medicalized Masculinities: (In)fertility, Sperm Donation and Fatherhood.” Altre Modernità 24 (2020);
139-152 [special issue on “Storytelling as Care: representing illness in the new protocols of Medical
Humanities,” eds. Paolo Caponi, Laura Scarabelli, Nicoletta Vallorani].
 https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/AMonline/article/view/14605

“Family in Crisis? What Crossing Borders and Crossing Narratives Tell Us About the State of the Family
(Today).” Andrea Carosso, Aida Rosende-Pérez, ESZ, eds. Family in Crisis? Crossing Borders, Crossing
Narratives. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2020; 9-23.

“He’s Not Family: Family between Genetic Essentialism and Social Parenthood in MTV’s Generation
Cryo.” Andrea Carosso, Aida Rosende-Pérez, ESZ, eds. Family in Crisis? Crossing Borders,
Crossing Narratives. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2020; 89-100.

“Family and the media: Cultural politics and public narratives” (with Andrea Carosso und Tetiana
Havlin).  International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics 15.2 (2019); 119-124.

“Mummy, me, and her podcast – feminist and gender discourses in contemporary podcast culture.” 
International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics 15.2 (2019); 143-161.

“’India is our twins’ motherland’: Transnational Cross-Racial Gestational Surrogacy and the
Maternal Body in ‘IP Memoirs’.” Feminist Encounters – A Journalof Critical Studies in Culture and
Politics 3.1-2 (2019): article number 11; 1-12.

“Love, Marriage and Family in the 21^st Century: All We Had (Annie Weatherwax), The Nest 
(Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney).” Michael Basseler, Ansgar Nünning, eds. The American Novel in
the 21^st Century: Cultural Contexts – Literary Developments – Critical Analyses. Trier:
EVT, 2019; 215-230.

“Motherhood and Mothering in Contemporary ‘IP Memoirs.’” Fabienne Portier-Le Cocq, ed. 
Motherhood in Contemporary International Perspective: Continuity and Change. London:
Routledge, 2019; 93-104.

“Breaking Conventions, Crossing Genres – Motherhood and Memoir in the Age of Surrogacy.”
Bunty Avieson, Fiona Giles, Sue Joseph, eds. Still Here: Memoirs of Trauma, Illness and
Loss. London: Routledge, 2019; 176-188.

“Reproductive Justice and (the Politics of) Transnational Gestational Surrogacy: Pande, 
Wombs in Labor: Transnational Commercial Surrogacy in India, Rudrappa, Discounted Life:
The Price of Global Surrogacy in India, Jacobson, Labor of Love: Gestational Surrogacy
and the Work of Making Babies, Solinger/Ross, Reproductive Justice, Briggs, How All
Politics Became Reproductive Politics.” American Quarterly 70.4 (December 2018); 889-901.

“Beyond the Page” content to review essay – online website of American Quarterly 
December 2018 [AQ’s promo of digital humanities].
 https://www.americanquarterly.org/content/december-2018.

“Mothers, ART and Narratives of (Be)longing.” CoSMo 12 (Spring 2018); 74-91.
 http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/COSMO/issue/view/272.

“Family Matters in Contemporary Literature – an introduction.” CoSMo 12 (Spring 2018);
7-10. http://www.ojs.unito.it/index.php/COSMO/issue/view/272.

“Anacreon in Baltimore: the ‘Star-Spangled Banner’ as Poem, Song and National Anthem.”
Engelbert Thaler, ed. Singer-Songwriters –Music & Poetry in Language Teaching.” 
Tübingen: Narr, 2018; 25-47.

“’At the other end of life’s rainbow’: Rabbit’s journey from adolescence to old age and
other transcendental trajectories.” Laurence W. Mazzeno, Sue Norton, eds. European
Perspectives on John Updike. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2018; 28-44.

“Community as Commodity: of Rotary Dream Homes and Gated Geritopias as Collective
Attempts to Lead a Private Life.” Lukas Etter, Julia Straub, eds. American Communities:
Between the Popular and the Political. Tübingen: Narr, 2017; 19-41.

“’Sara, Bill, Kristine, ...you’re pregnant!’ Gestational surrogacy, biomedicalized bodies
and reconceptualizations of motherhood.” Hektoen International. A Journal of Medical
Humanities (Fall 2017). http://hekint.org/2017/11/20/sara-bill-kristine-youre-pregnant-
gestational-surrogacy-biomedicalized-bodies-reconceptualizations-motherhood/.

“’My mother composed me as I now compose her’: Catharsis and Cathexis in Alison
Bechdel’s Are You My Mother?” Kerstin Shands, Guilia Grillo Mikrut, et al., eds. Writing
the Self. Essays on Autobiography and Autofiction. Stockholm: Södertörn UP [English
Studies 5], 2015; 163-172.

“Octavia Butler’s Kindred: ‘neo slave narrative’ als ‘literature of memory.’” Uwe Baumann,
Karl August Neuhausen, eds. Autobiographie: Eine interdisziplinäre Gattung zwischen
klassischer Tradition und (post-)moderner Variation. Super alta perennis. Studien zur Wirkung
der Klassischen Antike Bd. 14. Göttingen: V&R UniPress, 2013; 411-432.

“’Been to Barbados’ – Rum(bullion), race, the Gaspée, and the American Revolution.” Susanne
Schmid, Barbara Schmidt-Haberkamp, eds. Drink in the 18^th and 19^thCenturies: Consumers,
Cross-Currents, Conviviality. London: Pickering and Chatto, 2013; 141-150, 216-219.

“’Whatever senior living choice or lifestyle option you desire, you’re sure to find it’: 55+,
Age Segregation and the American Social Landscape.” Philip Coleman, Stephen Matterson,
eds. “Forever Young”? The Changing Images of America. Heidelberg: Winter, 2012; 21-41.

“’Ambition without love it cold’: Priority and Kudos in Oxygen by Carl Djerassi and Roald
Hoffman.” Walter Grünzweig, ed. The SciArtist: Carl Djerassi's Science-in-Literature in
Transatlantic and Interdisciplinary Contexts. Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2012; 75-90.

“Middle Class Life in the (Realist) Short Story of the 20^th Century: John Updike’s ‘The
Music  School’ and John Cheever’s ‘The Enormous Radio.’” Michael Basseler, Ansgar Nünning,
eds. A History of the American Short Story: Genres – Classics –  Model Interpretations.
Trier: WVT 2011; 289-305.

“Ciência e Drama: a situação.” [“Science and Drama: the situation”] Portuguese theater
journal Sinais de Cena 15 (2011) ; 17-23.

“Fun in the Cup: From the Italian Espresso Bar to the Globalized ‘Starbucks Experience.’”
Marina Camboni, Andrea Carosso, Sonia Di Loreto, Marco Mariano, eds. Translating
America. Bern: Lang, 2011; 49-64.

“’A good deal about California does not, on its own preferred terms, add up’: Joan Didion,
America’s highly personal, cultural literary historian, between apocalypse dawning and a
retrogressive utopia.” David Rio, Oyunn Hestetun, eds. EJAS Special Issueon Postfrontier
Writing 6.3 (2011) (http://ejas.revues.org/9245).

“’Pouring Your Heart Into It’ – a brand brewed from the grounds of Arabica.” Marina Camboni,

Andrea Carosso, Sonia di Loreto, eds. Translating America: Importing, Translating,
Misrepresenting, Mythicizing, Communicating America.Proceedings of the 20th AISNA 
Biennial Conference Torino, September 24-26, 2009. Torino: Otto, 2010; 219-229.

“James Watson and Rosalind Franklin: the backlash of gendered marginalization.”
Jane Jordan, Meg Jensen, eds. Life Writing: The State of the Art and The Spirit of the Age. 
Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars P, 2009; 87-98.

“Staging Science With Albert Einstein.” Cedric Barfoot, Valeria Tinkler, eds. Restoring the
Mysteries of the Rainbow: Literature’s Reflection of Science. 2 vols.
Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009; 554-566.

“Staging It: Bridging the Two Cultures? Mick Gordon, Paul Broks: On Ego.”Conference
volume ISSEI conference 2008 “Language and the Scientific Imagination”
 http://helda.helsinki.fi/bitstream/handle/10138/15321/55_Zehelein.pdf?sequence=1 

“Carl Djerassi’s Seed.” Critical Survey 20.1 (2008): 56-67.

“Against All Odds – ’Sam Hall’ and ‘The Man in Black’: From British Social Disparagement
to American Defiant Individualism.” The Outlaw and the American Cultural Landscape. ed.
Dr. Keagan LeJeune. American Studies Journal 50 (autumn 2007).
 http://www.asjournal.org/50-2007/sam-hall-and-the-man-in-black/

“’After all, sex isn’t everything’: T.C. Boyle’s The Inner Circle and Adam Thirlwell’s Politics 
as indices of ‘progressive sexual pessimism.’” Henry Frendo, ed. The European Mind:
Narrative and Identity. Vol. 1. Valetta: Malta UP, 2006; 757-768.

“Junot Díaz: This Is How You Lose Her.” Heinz Ludwig Arnold, ed. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon 
3^rd revised edition. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2009; online update; 2014.

“Joseph O’Neill: Niederland.” [Netherland] Heinz Ludwig Arnold, ed.Kindlers Literatur
Lexikon 3^rd revised edition. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2009; online update; 2012.

“Joseph O’Neill: Biogramm.” Heinz Ludwig Arnold, ed. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon 3^rd 
revised edition. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2009; online update; 2012.

“Siri Hustvedt: Was Ich Liebte.” [What I Loved] Heinz Ludwig Arnold, ed. Kindlers
Literatur Lexikon 3^rd revised edition. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2009. Pagination unknown.

“Siri Hustvedt: Biogramm.” Heinz Ludwig Arnold, ed. Kindlers Literatur Lexikon 3^rd revised
edition. Stuttgart: J.B. Metzler Verlag, 2009. Pagination unknown.

“Moses Herzog (Saul Bellow: Herzog).” Matthew J. Bruccoli, Judith S. Baughman et al., eds. 
The Student’s Encyclopedia of American Literary Characters. NY: Facts on File, 2008; 82.

Reviews

Richard Powers, “La vendetta del antropocene - The Overstory / Il Sussuro del Mondo.”
NY: Norton, 2018. L’Indice dei Libri del Mese. September 2019; 11.

Rosanna Hertz, Margaret K. Nelson, Random Families. Genetic Strangers, Sperm Donor
Siblings, and the Creation of New Kin. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2018.International Journal of
Media & Cultural Politics 15.2 (June 2019); 249-252.
 https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/mcp/2019/00000015/00000002;
jsessionid=3pmsd9rs5b2jh.x-ic-live-01

Jan D. Kucharzewski, Propositions about Life. Reengaging Literature and Science. Heidelberg:
Winter, 2011. Archiv für das Studium der Neueren Sprachen und Literaturen.
Vol. 250 (2013); 392-394.

Jerome de Groot, Consuming History. Historians and heritage in contemporary popular culture.
NY: Routledge, 2009. European Legacy 18.6 (2013); 811-812.

Peter S. Wenz, Beyond Red and Blue. How Twelve Political Philosophies Shape American Debates.
Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2009. European Legacy 17.6 (2012); 861-862.

Carl Djerassi, Four Jews on Parnassus [A Conversation]: Benjamin, Adorno, Scholem, Schönberg.
NY: Columbia UP, 2008. European Legacy 14.4 (2009); 506-507.

Helmut Schwarztrauber, Fiktion der Fiktion. Begründung und Bewahrung des Erzählens durch
theoretische Selbstreflexion im Werk N. Hawthornes und E. A. Poes. Heidelberg: Winter, 2000. 
Amerikastudien A Quarterly 50.3 (2005); 539-541.

Gregg D. Crane, Race, Citizenship and Law in American Literature. Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge UP,
2002.AmerikastudienA Quarterly 48.3 (2003); 469-470.