Ulysses 2.0? The Return to the Balkans in today’s transnational literature

The DePaul Hidai “Eddie” Bregu Lectures in Albanian Studies in Cooperation with The Martin Camaj Association (Germany) invites you to:

The DePaul Albanian Studies Annual Lecture

“Ulysses 2.0? The Return to the Balkans in today’s transnational literature”

Saturday, April 15th, 2023

5-7 PM

Levan Center Room 100

2322 N Kenmore Ave, Chicago, IL 60614

The lecture tries to define unique selling points of diaspora literature from the Balkans. Authors like Ornela Vorpsi, Aleksandar Hemon, Pajtim Statovci, Kapka Kassabova, Bekim Sejranović, Gazmend Kapllani, Miroslav Penkov, Lindita Arapi are typical representatives of vectorial, often translanguaging world literature (which started with the postcolonial Windrush generation in London in the 1950s).

A core motif is the literary figure of the returnee whose antiheroic national indifference is a challenge to the dominant patriotic narratives. This modern Ulysses tells his story about alienation and loneliness both in the country of origin (patriarchate, misogyny, homophobia) and the host country (racism, discrimination) and personalizes the hybrid “third space” paradigm and transcultural inbetweenness.

The DePaul Hidai “Eddie” Bregu Lectures in Albanian Studies series brings to DePaul campus each academic year distinguished artists and scholars of the literature, language, history, thought, and culture of Modern Albania and Southeastern Europe.

Dr. Belfjore Qose is a full-time lecturer at the University of Tirana since 2016. Among the courses she teaches are World Literature of the 20th Century part 1, Russian and Slavic Literatures, and Albanian Literature (for students of foreign languages). She is a member and founder of the Albanian Young Academy at the Albanian Academy of Science, as well as a member of the Permanent Commission of Language and Literature at the Academy of Sciences. She is a member of the "Martin Camaj" association based in Munich.

She defended her doctorate degree (2015) with a dissertation on K. Trebeshina, an Albanian writer forbidden during the communist regime. At the same department she completed a 4-year study program on “Albanian Language and Literature” and the Master of Sciences program, for which she was awarded as “Best student”. Her research work encompasses Albanian Modern and Contemporary Literature, Dissident Literature, Migrant Albanian Literature, Comparative Literature, Transnational Literature, Interdisciplinary Studies, Didactics and Teaching Modern Literature, etc. She has published extensively on Albanian and World Literature (e.g. on K. Trebeshina, M. Camaj, M. Bulgakov, N. Kazantzakis, D. H. Lawrence etc.) and addresses the interface of literary studies and arts. She and Prof. Dr. Ch. Voss from Humboldt University have started a series of conversations with Balkan authors, as well as original articles on "Balkan-World Literature" – published in the “Südosteuropa Mitteilungen” review in Germany and in “ExLibris” review in Albania.

Dr. Qose is an esteemed poet and prose writer, among others with the two poetry books “Auras of the Night” (2017) and “Luminance” (2020). The first was awarded by the Albanian Ministry of Culture a prize for young authors in 2017. Her poems are translated and published in many languages. Her interests also extend beyond the boundaries of disciplines, where the research on literature meets with literature as art and creative practice, as well as with other arts.

Christian Voss is a Professor and Head of the Department for South Slavic Studies at Humboldt University in Berlin since 2006. From 2008 until 2016 he was Vice Dean for Research at the Faculty of Philosophy II in Berlin. His research addresses the interface of sociolinguistics, historiography, and anthropology, and focuses on the South Slavic-Greek border region. His habilitation from 2004 „The Macedonian dialect/standard continuum“ was financed by the German Research Foundation (DFG). He is the principal researcher in several research projects, e.g. „Melting Borders“ on the small border traffic between the Republic of Macedonia and Greece, on identity issues among Balkan Muslims, on linguistic gender mainstreaming in Croatia, Serbia, and Albania, and on the historical boundaries in the Albanian-Macedonian contact zone.

He has published extensively on issues of sociolinguistics in the Balkans, especially on language decay and revitalization of Slavic varieties in Northern Greece. He (co-)edited several scientific volumes, among others „Minorities in Greece, Historical Issues and New Perspectives” (2003), „Marginal linguistic identities, Studies in Slavic contact and borderland varieties” (2006), „Habsburg vs. Ottoman legacy in the Balkans: Language and religion to the north and to the south of the Danube” (2010), “Co-Ethnic Migrations Compared, Central and Eastern European Contexts“ (2010), „Doing Gender – Doing the Balkans, Dynamics and Persistence of Gender Relations in Yugoslavia and the Yugoslav Successors or States“ (2012), “Innovative paths in Albanology” (2022) or “Memory Cultures since 1945: German-Southeast European Entangled History” (2023).

Since 2016, he is the director of the newly founded Interdisciplinary Center for transnational border research „Crossing Borders“ and supervisor of the emerging Competence Network „Liberal Arts in the Western Balkans“ (supported by ERASMUS+ and DAAD).

In 2021 he launched the interview series “Balkan-World Literatures” with Belfjore Qose from Tirana and in 2022 the series “Soft Power Literature?” on literary reception and imagology of Russia in the Balkans (both published regularly in “Südosteuropa-Mitteilungen”, cf. https://www.sogde.org/de/publikationen/suedosteuropa-mitteilungen/)

Christian Voss is the founder and editor of the book series „Studies on Language and Culture in Central and Eastern Europe“ (https://www.peterlang.com/series/slcc) and member of the editorial board of „Balkan Studies Library“, „Mediterranean Language Review“, „Südost-Forschungen“ and „Colloquia Humanistica“. Since 2012 he is a member of the „Classe di Slavistica“ at „Academia Ambrosiana“ in Milan, in 2022 he was visiting professor at Ca’Foscari University in Venice.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

DePaul University - Schmitt Academic Center, 2320 North Kenmore Avenue, Chicago, United States