Profile Prof. Dr. Philipp Schweighauser

Photo of Philipp Schweighauser

Philipp Schweighauser is Professor of North American and General Literature. He received his MA in English and German Philology and his PhD in Anglophone Literary Studies, both from the University of Basel. After a one-year research stay at the University of California, Irvine (2000-2001), a postdoc position at the University of Berne (2003-2007), and an Assistant Professorship at the University of Göttingen (2007-2009), he returned to the University of Basel in 2009. He was a visiting scholar at Harvard University and Boston University. From 2012 to 2020, Schweighauser served as the President of the Swiss Association for North American Studies. He teaches the Massive Open Online Course Literature in the Digital Age: From Close Reading to Distant Reading. He tweets under @pschweighaus.

He has worked on a wide variety of issues in American Studies, but his main foci are 18th to 21st c. American literature and culture; literary history, literary, cultural, and media theory; literature and science; literature and anthropology; life writing; sound studies; and aesthetics.

He is the author of ...
Boasian Verse: The Poetic and Ethnographic Work of Edward Sapir, Ruth Benedict, and Margaret Mead
(Routledge, 2023)
Beautiful Deceptions: European Aesthetics, the Early American Novel, and Illusionist Art (U of Virginia P, 2016)
The Noises of American Literature, 1890–1985: Toward a History of Literary Acoustics (UP Florida, 2006)

... and the co-editor of ...
Beckett and Media (Manchester UP, 2022)
Boasian Aesthetics: American Poetry, Visual Culture, and Cultural Anthropology (Amerikastudien/American Studies, 2018)
Literatur und Politische Philosophie: Subjektivität, Fremdheit, Demokratie (Wilhelm Fink, 2018)
Literature, Ethics, Morality: American Studies Perspectives (Gunter Narr, 2015)
Aesthetics in the 21st Century (Punctum Books, 2014)
Haunted Narratives: Life Writing in an Age of Trauma (U of Toronto P, 2013)
Terrorism, Media, and the Ethics of Fiction: Transatlantic Perspectives on Don DeLillo (Continuum, 2010)
Teaching Nineteenth-Century American Poetry (MLA, 2007)

He was the principal investigator of ...
Beckett's Media System: A Comparative Study in Multimediality (Swiss National Science Foundation, 2015–2019), which reevaluates Samuel Beckett as a media artist
Of Cultural, Poetic, and Medial Alterity (Swiss National Science Foundation, 2014–2017), which explores the poetry, films, and photographs of Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, and Edward Sapir

Schweighauser is currently working on a monograph on 21st c. Native American literature (Tommy Orange, Morgan Talty, Tommy Pico, and others).

See here for Schweighauser's full CV. Consultation hours are by appointment.

Ongoing PhD Theses

Title

Author

Supervisor (first/second)

Status

“And the rain won’t make any difference?”: A Farewell to Anthropocentrism in American Postbellum Prose from 1850-1970Aerni, AnoukSchweighauser, Philipp / Weik von Mossner, Alexa (Klagenfurt)ongoing
Structural Entanglements: Urban Experience and Narrative StructureImboden, Tamara DimaSchweighauser, Philipp / Frank, Michael C. (Zürich)ongoing
Race, Class, Power, and Academia 101: A Study on Contemporary Campus NovelsJimenez, IsabelSchweighauser, Philipp / NNongoing

Memory, Place, and the Postsouthern in Contemporary US Southern Literature

Kraft, CorinSchweighauser, Philipp / Lauer, Gerhardongoing
Radiophonie, Störung und Erkenntnis: Zur Epistemologie der RadiokunstMauruschat, AniaSchweighauser, Philipp / Mersch, Dieter (ZHdK)ongoing
A Brief History of Decay in American LiteratureOrtiz, DanielSchweighauser, Philipp / Mahan, David (Yale)ongoing
Belonging to Time: Mourning and Futurity in Black Diasporic ImaginariesParkhowell, LindsaySchweighauser, Philipp / NNongoing

Writing the Resounding Body: Technologies of the Aural in Samuel Beckett

(SNF project Beckett's Media System: A Comparative Study in Multimediality)

Rapcsák, Balázs

Schweighauser, Philipp / Krajewski, Markus / Nixon, Mark (Reading)

ongoing

Ancestral Heart Beats – Hip Hop’s Sonic Fictions from Black Atlantic Vögele, Pius J.Rizzo, Lorena / Schweighauser, Philippongoing


Completed PhD Theses

Title

Author

Supervisor (first/second)

Completion date

The Cultural Politics of Intelligences in 21st-Century Post-Apocalyptic and Dystopian Survival NarrativeAlbrecht, MaxiKelleter, Frank (FU Berlin) / Schweighauser, Philipp2021

Der Agon der Literatur

Kottoros, PhilippeSimon, Ralf / Schweighauser, Philipp2018
Representations of the Other in Selected Works of Joseph ConradOsei-Bonsu, VictoriaSchweighauser, Philipp / Steffen, Therese2018

Writing Anthropologists, Sounding Primitives: The Poetry and Scholarship of Edward Sapir, Margaret Mead, and Ruth Benedict

(SNF project Of Cultural, Poetic, and Medial Alterity...)

Reichel, A. ElisabethSchweighauser, Philipp / Rippl, Gabriele (Bern)2018

Pynchon's Sonic Fiction

Hänggi, Christian

Schweighauser, Philipp / Pöhlmann, Sascha

2017

"A picture held us captive": On Aisthesis and Interiority in Ludwig Wittgenstein, Fyodor M. Dostoevsky, and W. G. SebaldLobo, TeaHerlth, Jens (Fribourg) / Schweighauser, Philipp2017

Locating Gender in Space: Emily Dickinson's Conception of Gender

Caci, Ursula

Gygax, Franziska / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

Mapping a Sense of Humour – Fictional Geography and the Narrative Imperative in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Novels

Lüthi, Daniel

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

History, Critique, Utopia: Experimental Writing in the Context of Contemporary Anglophone Literature

Hägler, Andreas

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2015

Narrative and Becoming: Differential Narratology

Askin, Ridvan

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina / Hochbruck, Wolfgang (Freiburg)

2014

Common Nonsense: Community and Skepticism in Shakespearean Comedy

Gottlieb, Derek

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2014

Continuity in Comic Books and Comic Book Continuity - Serialized US-American Comic Books of the 1980s

Hoppeler, Stephanie

Rippl, Gabriele (Berne) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2014

Literary Acoustics: The Aural in the Fictions of Toni Morrison

Iatsenko, Anna

Madsen, Deborah (Geneva) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2014

Der Wandel des Kolumbussymbols in den USA: Vom Nationalhelden zur ethnischen Identifikationsfigur, 1892-1929

Loock, Kathleen

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2013

The Mirror, the Cup, and the Crystal: Iconic Implications of Disappearance and Representation in the American Tradition of Riddle Poetry

Bertoli, Mariacristina Natalia

Austenfeld, Thomas (Fribourg) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2012

Nomadic Truths: Exploring the Fantastic beyond Postmodernism

Huber, Irmtraud

Richter , Virginia (Berne) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2012

Eclipsing Melancholia: American Cultural Trauma Templates Before and After 9/11

Rickli, Christina

Claviez, Thomas (Berne) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2012

Writing Metamedia: Contemporary American Literature and the Matter of the Book, 1998-2010

Starre, Alexander

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen ) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2012

 

Completed MA Theses

Title

Author

Supervisor (first/second)

Completion date

All My Literary Relations: Bakhtinian Dialogism and Heteroglossia in Contemporary ‘Minor Literatures’ of Selected North American Aboriginal AuthorsJannetta, Francesco E. A.Schweighauser, Philipp / Shields, Andrew2020
Mapping the Spaces of Black Women in Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti Trilogy and Who Fears DeathLötscher, FlorenceSchweighauser, Philipp / Askin, Ridvan2020

"And yet the writing is of interest": Translation and Analysis of Arthur Conan Doyle’s "The Naval Treaty”    

Nanchen,  Magalie

Shields, Andrew / Schweighauser, Philipp

2019

Broadening Afropolitanism: ‘Afropolitanism at the Margins’ in Selasi’s Ghana Must Go, Bulawayo’s We Need New Names and Adichie’s Americanah

Bieri, Tina

Schlote, Christiane / Schweighauser, Philipp2018
“Fortified Morally by the Luxurious Surroundings”: The Interrelation Between Individualist and Consumerist E(s)th(et)ics in Patricia Highsmith’s RipliadCadalbert, Livia

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2018

Unheard Voices – Female Traumas and Ways of Healing in Transitional South Africa. The Representation of Female Trauma Manifestations as an Underlying Critique of the TRC. A Literary Analysis of Three Post-Apartheid Novels

Licina, Jasmina

Schweighauser, Philipp / Schlote, Christiane

2018
Chasing the Green Light: (Self-)Deception and Disillusionment in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Novels

Mondia, Michele 

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2018

Distance, Negation, Negotiation: The Aesthetic Politics in Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things and Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior

Ackermann, Rahel

Schweighauser, Philipp / Askin, Ridvan

2017

'And the rain won’t make any difference?' An Ecocritical Reading of Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell To Arms

Aerni, Anouk

Schweighauser, Philipp / Askin, Ridvan

2017

Revealing Reporters' Roles: Investigative Journalists in Nigerian NovelsGallana, SyrinaSchlote, Christiane / Schweighauser, Philipp2017

Snow White’s Stepmother and Other Mother Figures in Four Postmodern Revisions of the Tale by Donald Barthelme, Angela Carter, Robert Coover and Anne Sexton

Gloor, Nathalie Caroline

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2016

Women’s Lives in War Periods: Their Emergence on a Personal, Professional and Public Level

Lanfranchi, Silva

Steffen, Therese / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

Female Role Models in Contemporary Young Adult Literature: A Comparative Study of Twilight and The Hunger Games

Meng, Dorothee

Schweighauser, Philipp / Gygax, Franziska

2016

Cyborgs in Science Fiction Literature

Di Meo, Laura

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

Intermediality in Graphic Narrative Adaptations of American Crime Fiction Texts

Bosshart, Lea

Schweighauser, Philipp / Gygax, Franziska

2016

Where is Paradise? Images of Africa Developed by African Authors – A Comparison between Achebe's Things Fall Apart and Okri's The Famished Road

Dogan, Ezgi

Steffen, Therese / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

"I have no stories of my own" – The Importance of Stories and Storytelling in Neil Gaiman’s Sandman

Schüpbach, Johanna

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

Literary Translation of War and Paradise by Suzy Yaraei

Bucherer, Ruth

Shields, Andrew / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

"I Ate Some of Their Brains and Tried to Cook a Little": Serial Killing and Aesthetics in Thomas Harris' The Silence of the Lambs and Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho

Grüninger, Selin

Steffen, Therese / Schweighauser, Philipp

2016

A Gendered Literature – The Forgotten Male Voices in Canadian Literature

Haas, Heidi

Schweighauser, Philipp / Steffen, Therese

2016

Slaves to Memory: Place and Identity in the Collective Memory of Twentieth Century U.S. Southern Literature: William Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom!, Steve Yarbrough’s The Oxygen Man and Thulani Davis’ 1959

Kraft, Corin

Gygax, Franziska / Schweighauser, Philipp

2015

The Suburban Landscape: Architecture, Family and Gender Roles in Richard Yates’ Revolutionary Road, Sloan Wilson’s The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit and No Down Paymentdirected by Martin Ritt

Wyss, Stephanie Helena

Steffen, Therese / Schweighauser, Philipp

2015

The Flaneur in New York - A Long Stroll through the Centuries from his Beginnings in Paris to New York

Rüst, Axel

Schweighauser, Philipp / Steffen, Therese

2015

From the Self-Made Man to the "emperor of little boys": Masculinities as a Homosocial Enactment in Paul Auster’s The Locked RoomMoon Palace, and Man in the Dark

Lufuma Oppowa, Samira Melina

Steffen, Therese / Schweighauser, Philipp

2015

"But the Dead Returning Lightly Dance": Embodied Concepts of War and War Experience in First World War Poetry

Bischof, Roman

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2015

Babel's Impossible Languages: A Reading of Paul Auster's City of Glass and Jack Spicer's Detective Novel The Tower of Babel through Jacques Derrida and Michel Serres

Grzonka, Adrian

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2014

Comics: Begriffsdiskussion und Überlegungen zur Theorie einer unendlichen Geschichte

Jäger, Johannes

Holl, Ute / Schweighauser, Philipp

2014

Jewish Theology after Google: Post-Rabbinic and Post-Denominational Judaisms in a Digitized World

Pieck, Gabriele

Schweighauser, Philipp / Petry, Erik

2014

'We had no ties with the place': Spatial Identity in Paula Morris's Rangatira

Rindlisbacher, Jasmin

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2014

Nineteenth-Century Sensational Fiction in the United States

Battilana, Chantal

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2012

Later Robert Coover: Comic Metafiction and Hypertext Structures

Hottinger, Philipp

Schweighauser, Philipp / Brönnimann, Werner

2012

Reappropriating Place and Reconstructing Space in Powwow Highway and Selected North American Indian Literature and Film between 1970-2010

Rutz, Sadhana

Schweighauser, Philipp / Steffen, Therese

2012

The Treatment of Native American Female Identity in Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony and Louise Erdrich's Love Medicine

Van den Bergh, Katrien

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2012

Some Are Born Wicked, Some Have Wickedness Thrust Upon Them: Subversive Re-creation of Fairy Tale Characters in the Modern Fantasy of Pratchett and Maguire

Walder, Laura

Habermann, Ina / Schweighauser, Philipp

2011

Gendered Landscapes: Feminized and Masculinized Depictions of Nature in 19th Century American Travel Literature

Carlos, Peter

Schweighauser, Philipp / Habermann, Ina

2010

The Transformation of Dada in William Carlos Williams's Kora in Hell: The Contention with Romantic Tradition in Modern American Verse

Gabcke, Wieland

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2010

Identitätskonstruktionen an der Grenze: Gloria Anzaldúas Borderlands/La Frontera

Fischer, Rebecca

Schweighauser, Philipp / Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen)

2009

Concepts of Deception in Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Lüpke, Bastian

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2009

Representations of Masculinities in Twentieth-century American Drama: Economics, the American Dream, and the Staging of Masculinity

Springer, Christian

Schweighauser, Philipp / Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen)

2009

Interkulturalität und Intermedialität in der Chicano-Literatur, 1978-1990

Achtert, Christina

Schweighauser, Philipp / Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen)

2008

Intermedialität und Medienkritik im New Journalism Tom Wolfes

Bartram, Sigrid

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

The Character of the Con Man in the Films of David Mamet

Bühring, Dennis

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

Stereotyping the Italians: The Mafia Mystique in post-World War II American Literary and Popular Culture

Ernst, Christin

Schweighauser, Philipp / Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen)

2008

Förderung des Empathievermögens mit literarischen Texten im Fremdsprachenunterricht anhand des Romans Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

Gerlach, Janine

Surkamp, Carola (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

Presidential Persuasion from the Party Pulpit: Nomination Acceptance Speeches, 1952-2004

von der Heyde, Sven

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

Postmoderner Humor im Gonzo Journalism von Terry Southern und Hunter S. Thompson

Holdack-Janssen, Eva

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

The Historiographic Functions of Character in Selected Plays by Suzan-Lori Parks

Möller, Swantje

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2008

Wilderness and Woods: The Construction of Nature in Colonial American Captivity Narratives, 1675-1713

Starre, Alexander

Kelleter, Frank (Göttingen) / Schweighauser, Philipp

2007


Completed Lizentiatsarbeit

Title

Author

Supervisor (first/second)

Completion date

Later Robert Coover: Comic Metafiction and Hypertext Structures

Hottinger, Philipp

Schweighauser, Philipp / Brönnimann, Werner

2012