International Symposium - “We All Think You’re a Grand Girl” * - The Many Returns of Antigone

(Quote: Ismene in "Anne Carson, Antigonick")

Antigone is a fighter for the right to last rites, the guardian of flesh and bones, and, implicitly, of the afterlife. However, by virtue of her name and origin as the daughter of Oedipus, she is also “against birth” and supposedly brings an end to the tragic fate of her family by refusing to take the position of the mother. One of the many mysteries surrounding Sophocles' heroine thus arises in connection with femininity: she seems to figure primarily as daughter and as sister, but is she actually a woman?

At times of fundamental crisis, be it the collapse of the social fabric, the corruption of law, the lack of political representation or the confrontation of violent state power and resistance movements, the latter often framed as “terrorism”, the figure of Antigone is sure to be invoked as in the films on the “Years of Lead” in Italy (Liliana Cavani: I cannibali, 1969), the “German Autumn” in the FRG (Div.: Deutschland im Herbst, 1978), or in the novel on the situation of Muslim migrant families in contemporary England (Kamila Shamsie: Home Fire, 2017).

The symposium aims to examine these modern and contemporary discussions and adaptations of the ancient tragedy. Based on the theoretical foundations laid out by thinkers like Jacques Lacan, Judith Butler, Alenka Zupančič, and Elissa Marder, we are especially interested in the setting and crossing of gender and family boundaries and the liminal space of (breaking) the law.

PROGRAM

Friday., 13.02.26

BLAUER SALON
14:30 Arrival
15:00 - 16:00 Sami Khatib (Karlsruhe), Introduction + Nadine Hartmann (Karlsruhe), “From Tragedy to Tragedy”
16:00 - 17:30 Film Screening

RAUM 112
17:45 - 18:45 Dominiek Hoens (Belgium), “And Once Again, No!”
19:00 - 20:00 Barbara Kuon (Karlsruhe), “Becoming Diamond”

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Saturday., 14.02.26

RAUM 112
10:00 - 11:00 Marc de Kesel (Belgium), “Why Antigone is a Beauty: On the Ethical Dimension of the Aesthetic”
11:00 - 12:00 ​​Andjela Samardzic (Zurich), ”Antigone on the Couch: désir and impasse of psychoanalysis”
12:00 - 13:30 Lunch
13:30 - 14:30 Rachel Aumiller (Nijmegen), “Antigone and the Fantasy of Non-Binary Violence”
14:45 - 16:15 Milica Tomic & Jelena Petrovic (Belgrade / Graz), “The Case of Antigona: On Political Temporality in Yugoslav Void”

BLAUER SALON
16:45 - 17:45 Hannah Proctor (Glasgow), “First as Tragedy, Next as Melodrama”
18:00 - 20:00 Film Screening

Organized by:
Prof. Dr. Nadine Hartmann , Prof. Dr. Sami Khatib , Dr. Barbara Kuon