We are pleased to invite you to the third lecture of the American Studies Colloquium Series in the 2025/26 Spring semester!
Antke A. Engel Dr.phil
(iQt – Institute for Queer Theory, Berlin)
“Queerversity as an Aesthetic Principle:
Colonial ghosts and fog machines in the work of Pauline Boudry/Renate Lorenz”
Thursday, May 14, 2026
at 4:45 p.m.
You can get 3 OZN points for participating in this event.
Where?
Dobra 55, room 2.118
(the building features some mobility accommodations: ramp and lift)
What?
Queerversity, a refined version of diversity, arouses interest in the complexity of difference – its intersectional interdependency and aesthetic or re/presentational modes. It strengthens modes of difference beyond classification: ambiguity, multiplicity, singularity, alterity. As an ethical or political principle, queerversity engages trans*versal justice in order to find nonviolent and respectful ways of dealing difference. Yet, what does it mean to propose queerversity also as an aesthetic principle? In this talk I will sketch queerversity as an aesthetic principle which can be detected in and fosters cultural or artistic practices that overcome addictions to binary oppositions and classificatory thinking. It aims at finding pleasure in complexity, confusion, and conflict in order to overcome the violence of normalcy. In order to develop these thoughts, I will engage with an art installation and video work by the Berlin based artist duo Pauline Boudry/Renate Lorenz “Glass is My Skin” (Palacio de Cristal/Museum Reina Sofia, Madrid 2022; video HD 12’, 2025).
Who?
Antke A. Engel (Dr. phil.) is a philosopher working in the fields of queer theory, poststructuralist philosophy, and visual cultural studies. In 2006 Engel has founded the Institute for Queer Theory (iQt) in Berlin (http://www.queer-institut.de) and since then functions as its director. They were Asa Briggs fellow at the University of Sussex and visiting fellow at the Gender Institute of the London School of Economics as well as the Institute of Cultural Inquiry Berlin, and since 2003 regularly holds guest professorships in Gender and Queer Studies. On a guest professorship at FernUni Hagen they released in 2021 open access introductory videos to queer theory (https://e.feu.de/queer-
photo credit: Caption: Pauline Boudry/Renate Lorenz. Installation view of Glass is my Skin, Palacio de
Cristal/Museum Reina Sofia, Madrid 2022. Photo: Annik Wetter. Courtesy of the artists.
