Sebastian Böck

born in 1987 in Wernigerode. 2007 received school leaving certificate at the Landschulheim Grovesmühle. Studied Cultural Sciences, European History and German Studies at the University of Magdeburg. Between 2011 and 2013 worked there as an academic assistant at the Faculty of Modern German Literature. 2013 completed Master's study with distinction, the topic of his dissertation being "The Grey Towel of Boredom. On the Problem Area of Work and Boredom in Georg Büchner's "Leonce and Lena". From October 2014 graduate student at the Research Training Group GRK 1787.


Doctoral project: Literary Museum Exhibitions in the Digital Age. The Example of the Hölderlin Tower
Literary museums, author's houses and literary memorials and their surroundings represent places of literature and are for the most part seen as authentic in the public sphere. As an institution, the literary museum not only looks after the collection and the interpretation and conservation of literary cultural artifacts, but also in its targeted public presentation it contributes to literary dissemination for a wider public outside of academia. Further, in exhibiting - in showing and inherently construing literature - they constitute a cultural practice which both produces an own historically malleable knowledge (of literature) as well as taking part in processes of canonization and current research discourse.
Against the backdrop of the rapid career of digital media since the end of the 20th century as well as the parallel to the "museum boom", the question is asked in the doctoral project as to the effects of digitization on the theory and practice of current literary exhibitions. Aside from the possibilities of utilizing new media technology and formats, their artistic challenges and the added curatorial value interest above all the specific - traditionally analogue - mediality of the literary museum with respect to its object: literature and its necessary reassessment under the conditions of a near-omnipresent digitality today.
These considerations are illustrated through the example of Tübingen's Hölderlin Tower, whose reorganization will procedurally guide the project.