About this Event
Who shapes (German) history? Who bears responsibility for past guilt? Which memories are told, and which remain unheard? In her book Traumaland, Asal Dardan challenges entrenched memory discourses with her quest for connections, simultaneous experiences, and hope for a shared remembrance that accommodates different realities. Traumaland conjures a new topography of Germany, traces the past, and explores parallel and contrasting experiences in societies shaped by migration and exile. The painful past reaches into our present, with Nazi crimes echoing in today’s racist discourses and violence, within and beyond Germany’s borders.
On 27 November 2025, the DAAD Cambridge Research Hub for German Studies will be hosting Asal Dardan. In conversation with Tara Talwar Windsor, she will read extracts from Traumaland and discuss the politics of history and memory, the public role of writers, and the impact of moving across borders and languages.
The event will be held in English with readings in German (translations will be provided).
About the speakers
Asal Dardan studied Cultural Studies in Hildesheim and Middle Eastern Studies in Lund and now lives in Berlin and Öland. She was awarded the Caroline Schlegel Prize for Essay Writing for her text ‘Neue Jahre’ (New Years). Her essay collection Betrachtungen einer Barbarin (Reflections of a Barbarian, 2021) was nominated for the German Non-Fiction Prize and the Clemens Brentano Prize. In May 2023, she gave the first Erika Mann Lecture at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. Her latest book Traumaland was published in January 2025 and featured in a list of most important non-fiction books curated by 30 jurors for ZDF, Deutschlandfunk Kultur and Die Zeit in February 2025. As a translator, she has translated work by Namwali Serpell and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie into German.
Dr Tara Talwar Windsor is Research Associate and Affiliated Lecturer in the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics, specialising in modern German culture, literature and history, with particular interest in the public roles of creative intellectuals. She contributes to the Horizon Europe/UKRI-funded project entitled ‘The Cartography of the Political Novel in Europe’ (CAPONEU) and co-leads the research group ‘Cultural Production and Social Justice’. She is a member of the DAAD Cambridge Research Hub for German Studies management committee and a trustee of the British German Association.
The event will take place at 5.30pm on 27 November in the Lecture Theatre at Trinity Hall (Trinity Ln, Cambridge CB2 1TJ) followed by a drinks reception.
Please be aware that photographs of the event will be taken. If you would not like to be photographed, please make yourself known to us at the event.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Trinity Hall Cambridge, Trinity Lane, Cambridge, United Kingdom
GBP 0.00
