New German Studies faculty member Jennifer Gully talks with Mike Blum about her research and teaching. Jennifer received her M.A. at the University of Vienna and her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at UCLA. Her research focuses on translation as a conflicted and often antagonistic process in literature and film. The “clash of languages” has become a fascinating area of discussion and research as multi-lingualism increasingly calls into question the hegemony of the one national language, often an illusion to begin with, and the very unity of understanding and communication are placed under pressure. Jennifer is teaching German Language, Literature, and Film at W&M, and she uses in her work such examples as diverse as Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Bastards and W.G. Sebald’s haunting novel Austerlitz to show how various languages in conflict and the difficulty of translation persist even still, or precisely, in the era of unprecedented anglicization and globalization.
Brava!