M.A. Cedric Essi (Wiss. Mitarbeiter)

American Studies – Literary Studies - Cultural Studies

E-Mailessi@uni-bremen.de
BüroGW 2, A 3710
Telefon0421 218-68132
SprechzeitenMittwochs, 13:00 – 14:00 Uhr

Curriculum Vitae

  • Lecturer at the Department of English-Speaking Cultures, University of Bremen (since April 2015)
  • Lecturer at the chair of American Studies, esp. Literary and Cultural Studies, FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg (2011-2014)
  • Dissertation project: “Interracial Family Memoirs: Reconstructing Genealogies across the Color Line” (since 2011)
  • Lecturer at the English Language Department, University of Würzburg (2010)
  • M.A. & Staatsexamen in American Studies, English Studies, and French Studies, University of Würzburg (2009)
  • Teaching assistant for German as a foreign language in Auxerre, France (2005/06)

Fellowships & Grants

  • 2017: Fulbright American Studies Award, UC Berkeley
  • 2017: Dartmouth College, Futures of American Studies Institute, BAA Fellow
  • 2014: DAAD Travel Grant to present a paper at the Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference at DePaul University, Chicago
  • 2013: Yale University Research Fellowship (BAA), Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Abolition, and Resistance
  • 2013: Spring Academy, Heidelberg Center for American Studies
  • 2013: Travel Grant from the Dr. Alfred-Vinzl-Foundation to present a paper at the Collegium for African American Research (CAAR) in Atlanta
  • 2012: BAA Summer Academy “Democratic Cultures, Past and Present,” Washington D.C.
  • 2011: Harvard University Research Fellowship (BAA)
  • 2011-2014: Graduate Fellowship of the Bavarian State (Bayerische Eliteförderung)
  • 2008: BAA Summer Institute “Ethnicity and Society in America,” Munich

Courses

  • “Introduction to Queer Studies”
  • “Introduction to English Literatures”
  • “Critical Mixed Race Studies” together with Heike Paul as part of the 'Mixed Race Initiative' of the Asian American Literary Review
  • “African American Autobiography”
  • “Me, Myself, and I? Auto/Biographical Representations in North America”
  • “Mixed Race in American Literature and Culture”
  • “Aufbauseminar Culture”
  • “Grundkurs Culture”
  • “Translation: English-German”
  • “Advanced English Practice”
  • “German as a foreign language” (PAD)

Research

  • African American Studies
  • Critical Mixed Race Studies
  • Critical Whiteness Studies
  • Life Writing

Publications

    Rev. of Troubling the Family: The Promise of Personhood and the Rise of Multiracialism, by Habiba Ibrahim. Amerikastudien/American Studies 63.1 (2018): 24-27. Print.

    “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s, Too”: Toward Critical Mixed Race Studies.” Zeitschrift für Anglistik und Amerikanistik 65.2 (2017): 161-72.

    “Return to Which Roots? Interracial Documemoirs by Macky Alston, Eliaichi Kimaro, and Mo Asumang.” Migrating the Black Body: The African Diaspora and Visual Culture. Ed. Leigh Raiford and Heike Raphael-Hernandez. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2017. 170-84.

    With Stephen Koetzing und Monika Sauter. COPAS: Current Objectives of Postgraduate American Studies 15.1 (2014).

    “Transnational Affiliations in the Mixed Race Memoir: Barack Obama's Dreams from My Father.”American Lives. Hg. Alfred Hornung. Heidelberg: Winter, 2013. 261-81.

    “Black Like Who? Weiße Autoren und ethnische Minderheiten.” Anglophone Literaturdidaktik – Zukunftsperspektiven für den Englischunterricht. Ed. Julia Hammer et al. Heidelberg: Winter, 2012. 161-76.

Papers & Lectures

    “'Dads, Are We There Yet?' Queer Interracial Adoption & Autobiographical Calls for Recognition.” Gender Studies Lecture Series, University of Marburg, June 2018.

    “Queer Memoirs about Interracial Adoption: Domestic Intimacies, Public Interventions, and the Rise of Multiracialism.” Annual Conference of the German Association for American Studies, FU Berlin, May 2018.

    “Coming Out as Family: Queer Interracial Kinship and the Closet(s) of Multiracialism.” Black Bag Speaker Series, Portland State University, Nov. 2017.

    “Cross-Racial Mothering as a ‘Conversion’ Experience: Jane Lazarre's Beyond the Whiteness of Whiteness: Memoir of a White Mother of Black Sons.” Learning at the Margins: The Creation and Dissemination of Knowledge among African Americans and Jews, German Historical Institute, Washington D.C., Sept. 2017.

    “The Allure of Diasporic Homecoming: Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father and Ika-Hügel Marshall’s Daheim Unterwegs.” Making America - Lecture Series, University of Bamberg, July 2017.

    “Interracial Family Memoirs: Claiming Genealogies across the Color Line.” Futures of American Studies Institute, Dartmouth College, June 2017.

    Panel Discussion. “Die Lage der Nation: Wissenschaft, Kultur und Politik in Zeiten von Donald Trump.” Annual Conference of the German Association for American Studies, June 2017.

    “Travelling African American Studies.” Harvard Club of Munich-Alumni Event, Oct. 2016.

    “Amerikanistische Perspektiven auf rassismuskritische Pädagogik.” Fachtagung Ohne Angst Verschieden Sein, Jugendbildungstätte Unterfranken, Nov. 2016.

    “Interracial Family Memoirs: Claiming Genealogies across the Color Line.” Current Research in English and American Studies, University of Flensburg.

    “Interrogating Autobiographical Registers on Transracial Adoption.” Transnational and Transracial Adoption in North American Culture, University of Turku, August 2015.

    “MiscegeNation as a Family Secret: American Memoir and Interracial Kinship at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century.” W.E.B. Du Bois Lectures, Humboldt University of Berlin, Jan. 2015.

    “Transnational Quests for 'Kinfulness:' Afro-German and African American Mixed Race Memoirs.” Global Mixed Race: Critical Mixed Race Studies Conference, DePaul University (Chicago), Nov. 2014.

    “Searching for Family across Race and Space: Interracial Family Documemoirs.” Migrating the Black Body: The African Diaspora and Visual Culture, Schloss Herrenhausen (Hanover), Sept. 2014.

    “From Miscegenation to Melting Pot Rhetoric? The Politics of the Interracial Family Memoir and Critical Mixed Race Studies.” The Futures of Black Studies, University of Bremen, April 2014.

    “Back to Imaginary Homelands: Transnational Quests in Interracial Family Memoirs.” Transcultural Autobiography, University of Münster, March 2014.

    “Interracial Family Memoirs – Reconstructing Genealogies across the Color Line.” Brown Bag Lunch Talk Series, Yale University (New Haven), Sept. 2013.

    “A Gray Area: White Parents' Memoirs about Their Black Children.” HCA Spring Academy, Heidelberg, March 2013.

    “(Re)Constructing Interracial Families: Mixed Race Movements & Mixed Race Memoirs.” Collegium for African American Research (CAAR), Atlanta, March 2013.

    “Von Dienern, Heiligen und Afronauten – (Dis)Kontinuitäten schwarzer Präsenzen in der deutschen visuellen Kultur.” Public lecture at the exhibition “Homestory Deutschland – Schwarze Biografien in Geschichte und Gegenwart,” Nuremberg, Jan. 2013.

    “Rethinking Kinship: Interraciality & Family in Contemporary American Life Writing.” American Studies Colloquium, University of Göttingen, June 2012.

    “Transnational Affiliations in the Mixed Race Memoir: Barack Obama's Dreams from My Father.” Annual Conference of the German Association for American Studies (GAAS), Mainz, June 2012.

    “Washington's Interracial Genealogies: From Thomas Jefferson to Barack Obama.” BAA Summer Academy “Democratic Cultures, Past and Present,” Washington, D.C., May 2012.

    “From Historiographic to Fictional Explorations of Interracial Intimacy under Slavery: Edward Ball'sSlaves in the Family and Alice Randall's The Wind Done Gone.” Writing Slavery after Beloved, Université de Nantes, March 2012.

    “A House Divided? Interracial Genealogies in Contemporary American Life Writing.” American Civilization Workshop, Harvard University (Cambridge), Oct. 2011.

    “The Democratization of Ethnic Identification? Multiraciality in US American Culture.” BAA Summer Academy “Transatlantic American Studies,” Nuremberg, May 2011.

Organization of Conferences & Workshops

  • “20 Questions and Answers on Black Europe with Stephen Small.” Schwankhalle Bremen, June 2018. (With Julia Borst)
  • “Black Performance Studies Workshop with Lara-Sophie Milagro.” Doctoral Network Perspektiven in der Kulturanalyse, University of Bremen, Jan. 2018.
  • “Black Performance Studies Workshop with Jaye Austin Williams” Doctoral Network 'Perspektiven in der Kulturanalyse,' University of Bremen, Aug. 2016.
  • PGF Workshop (with Stephen Koetzing and Monika Sauter), Annual Conference of the German Association for American Studies (GAAS), Würzburg, June 2014.
  • PGF – Postgraduate Forum of the GAAS (with Stephen Koetzing and Monika Sauter), Erlangen, Oct. 2013.
  • Cultural Program and Funding of the Nuremberg Exhibit of “Homestory Deutschland: Schwarze Biographien in Geschichte und Gegenwart” (with Lydia Taylor, et al., in cooperation with the ISD), Jan./Feb. 2012.
  • Workshop “Multiracial Genealogies in American Life Writing, Past and Present” (with Heike Paul), Annual Conference of the German Association for American Studies (GAAS), Mainz, June 2012.