You have become acquainted with important Slavic representatives of postmodern literature, reflected on the peculiarities of this literary epoch, and deconstructed central texts of poststructuralism.

In the 1960s, a new kind of writing emerged: playful, provocative, ironic, self-referential. With post-structuralist theories in the background, reality was declared war on, indeed reality itself was unmasked as a construct and taken apart. This inherent denial of any certainty holds some political explosive power and challenges both - before 1989/1991 - restrictive socialist regimes in Eastern Europe and - after the collapse of communism - the 'blessings' of globalized capitalism. At the same time, postmodern texts always remain at an ironic distance and do not want to be pinned down. However, this taking oneself out of the game is becoming increasingly problematic in the 21st century, because discourse-disrupting strategies - such as 'fake news' - are being used by state actors with great success, forcing us to reconsider concepts such as 'truth' and 'reality'.

The seminar therefore aims to trace this crisis of postmodernism. To this end, fundamental theoretical positions of poststructuralism will be discussed and their implementation in literature will be traced. Not only will the political relevance of concrete postmodern texts be critically reflected, but also the current state of postmodern Slavic literatures will be contrasted with post-postmodern approaches, such as the 'New Sincerity'. The list of possible authors that we may cover during the semester includes Milorad Pavić, Venedikt Erofeev, Jiří Kratochvil, Liudmila Ulitskaia, Tat'iana Tolstaia, Dubravka Ugrešić, Vladimir Sorokin, Oksana Sabuzhko, Iurii Andruchovych, Jáchym Topol, Olga Tokarczuk, Viktor Pelevin, Miljenko Jergović, Serhii Zhadan and Dorota Masłowska.

Flipped classroom - students prepare texts in self-study and work on assignments; classroom times are exclusively for plenary discussions and to clarify open questions. Literary and theoretical texts are used as preparatory materials, as well as short video lectures if required.

Oral presentation, term paper (can later be reworked into a Bachelor's thesis)

A bibliography will be supplied at the start of the semester.

1. BA-students: successful completion of compulsory module 11 a

2. LA-students (Curriculum 2015): successful completion of compulsory module 10 b