Florian Schybilski
Associated Doctoral Fellow
Campus Am Neuen Palais
Am Neuen Palais 10
Building 19, Room 0.25
14469 Potsdam
Germany
consulting hours
Winter Semester 2019:
Mondays, 1:00-2:00pm
Dissertation Project
Modernity as Salvation
My dissertation project operates under the assumption that anti-caste activism has engendered new ways of being ‘modern’ in the (post)colony of India. Following Satyanarayana’s, Gajarawala’s and Brueck’s arguments for a Dalit literary modernity, it attempts to locate other Dalit modernities in an investigation into the role of salvation in the – at first sight – secular context of Dalit activism. Originally designed to primarily focus on literary and political Dalit self-production, my attention is gradually shifting to include evidence from (pop)cultural sources and everyday practices such as Dalit entrepreneurship as well as laying claim to public presence via self-fashioning in a Dalit chic. These kinds of activism and cultural production are complicated by reading them through ‘salvation’, which is used to interrogate the assumed secularity of modernity in general as well as Dalit anti-caste activism in its focus on this mortal world in particular.
Biography
Florian is an associate with the DFG-funded Research Training Group Minor Cosmopolitanisms at the University of Potsdam, where he also holds a position as lecturer at the Department of English and American Studies. His PhD thesis titled “Modernity as Salvation” attempts to locate different ‘Dalit modernities’ in an investigation into the role of ‘salvation’ in secular contexts. Splitting more than a year between the University of Delhi and EFL University Hyderabad, Florian has researched possibilities for and realities of cosmopolitan alliances in Dalit writing and activism before joining the University of Potsdam. He is also co-editor of the recently established Journal of Anglophone Modernities.
Research Interests
- Nation and Nationalism
- Ideology and Forms of Resistance
- Postcolonial Studies
- Cosmopolitanisms
- Dalit Literature and Activism
Teaching
“Introduction to Cultural Studies.” Undergraduate Seminar. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Winter Term 2019/20.
“Modernity as Salvation.” Undergraduate Seminar. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Summer Term 2019.
“A Private Empire? – Reading the East India Company.” Undergraduate Seminar. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Winter Term 2018/19.
“Caste Away: Writing Caste in India and Great Britain.” Undergraduate Seminar. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Summer Term 2018.
“Masala Modernities.” Field Trip. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Winter Term 2017/18.
“Delhi – Pre-colonial, Colonial, and Postcolonial Capital City.” Undergraduate Seminar. Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany. Winter Term 2017/18.
Selected Conference Papers
“Modernity as Salvation – Dalit Self-Assertion Through Global Pop” (ongoing).
“Modernity as Salvation in Narendra Jadhav's Outcaste” (Conference: ASAS Conference, Ireland India Institute, April 2019).
“Dalit Human Literature/Dalit World Literature” (Conference: World Literature - Postcolonial Perspectives, University of Delhi, March 2018).
“‘I Shall Mix Genres’ – Genre Politics in Meena Kandasamy’s The Gypsy Goddess” (Conference: Writing the Cosmopolitan Imagination, University of Delhi – December 2016).
Conference and Workshop Organization
Conference Organizing Team: “Masala Modernities.” Spring School. University of Delhi, 12-14 March 2018.
Conference Organizing Team: “Carnival of Literatures.” International festival for English-language Literatures focusing on authors from the Global South, University of Potsdam and Werkstatt der Kulturen, Potsdam and Berlin, 15-16 July 2016.
Conference Organizing Team: “Postcolonial Justice.” 25. Annual Conference of the German Association for New English Literature (GNEL/GAPS) and the 14. Biannual Conference of the German Association for Australian Studies (GASt), University of Potsdam, 2014.
Conference Organizing Team: “Just Politics? Postcolonial Ecocriticism between Imagination and Occupation.” 11th ASNEL Summer School, University of Potsdam, 2013.
Selected Scholarships, Awards and Memberships
Associate at the Graduate School Minor Cosmopolitanisms (DFG funded), University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany.
Alumnus of the International Teaching Professionals Program, Potsdam Graduate School, University of Potsdam, 2019.
DAAD/UGC Research Scholarship, 2 months. University of Delhi, 2019.
DAAD/UGC Research Scholarship, 1 month. University of Delhi, 2018
DAAD/UGC Study Scholarship, 6 months. University of Delhi, 2016/17.
DAAD Study Scholarship, 6 months. EFL University Hyderabad, 2014/15.
Academic and Professional Development
10/2019 – today
Associate, Graduate School “Minor Cosmopolitanisms” (DFG funded), University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany
10/2017 – today
Lecturer (wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter), Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany.
2012 – 2017
Research/Teaching Assistant (wissenschaftliche Hilfskraft), Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany.
2013 – 2014
Freelance Researcher, “Ernst Reuter als gewählter Volksvertreter 1921-1933”, Ernst Reuter Archives Foundation, Germany.
2012 – 2013 Tutor for American English (wissenschaftliche Hilfskraft), Zentrum für Sprachen und Schlüsselkompetenzen, University of Potsdam, Germany.
2011 – 2012 Tutor for Academic Writing (wissenschaftliche Hilfskraft), Department of English and American Studies, University of Potsdam, Germany.
Responsibilities included:
Assistant Director of the bilateral research and exchange network “Writing the Cosmopolitan Imagination: Genre Transactions in World-Literary Space” (DAAD/UGC), 2016-19.
Assistant Director of the International Study and Training Partnership Program “University of Potsdam – EFL University Hyderabad” (DAAD), 2013-15.
Liaison work with international partners
Research and editing work
Organization of various conferences and workshops