Cologne Media Conversations

Die Cologne Media Conversations stellen das zentrale Format der Arbeit des Zentrums für Medien- und Moderneforschung dar. Das Zentrum spricht in jedem Semester Einladungen an international anerkannte Gastwissenschaftler*innen aus, deren Arbeitsgebiete an die bestehenden interdisziplinären Strukturen und die medienwissenschaftliche Forschungsfragen der Philosophischen Fakultät anknüpfen.

Die Eingeladenen besuchen die Fakultät, halten einen öffentlichen Abendvortrag und bieten eine Masterclass für fortgeschrittene Studierende und Doktorand*innen an. Hiermit machen die Cologne Media Conversations die internationale Anbindung der Kölner Forschung zu Medien und Moderne sichtbar und tragen zur Graduiertenausbildung bei.

Öffentlicher Vortrag und Master Class

Mittwoch, 29. Oktober 2025 | 18-19:30 | Seminarraum S21 (Seminargebäude 106)

Far-right and masculinity: contemporary political discourse in Latin America

Jazmín Duarte Sckell (FU Berlin)

As the global far-right has risen, and with it the campaigns of anti-gender moral panics, the trend of mobilization and radicalization of men in the context of elections, such as Trump (2016/2024) in the USA and Bolsonaro in Brazil (2018), has drawn attention. Since these events, the literature and academic analysis on the online spaces of men's radicalization known as the “manosphere” has grown, with more emphasis on the global north. This paper explores the type of narratives existing in Latin America belonging to the manosphere space and of influence of the extreme right, based on the discourse analysis of the YouTube accounts of politicians representing the far right. Starting from the idea of the gender category as a symbolic glue, and placing masculinity as a central element of mobilization of reactionary groups, the aim is to identify the main ideas and models of masculine behavior proposed by the far right today.

Der Vortrag ist öffentlich.

Jazmin Duarte Sckell (she/her) is a Paraguayan sociologist and PhD in Latin American Studies from the Universität zu Köln. Her areas of interest and research include gender relations, analysis of narratives/ symbolic-social discourses and authoritarianism. Her current postdoctoral project in the cluster SCRIPTS at the Freie Universität explores the connections between masculinity and far-right propaganda in Latin America.

Begleitend hierzu:

Masterclass: Narratives and counternarratives to fight the far-right discourse: examples from Latin America

Mittwoch, 30. Oktober 2025 | 10-11:30 | Raum S81 im Philosophikum

Far-right discourse has become part of the norm in current political and cultural narratives, as more extremist politicians and influencers come to power or gain popularity in different parts of the world. In this masterclass, we will analyse some of the common narratives and strategies of different far-right groups globally, with the aim of understanding their key ideas and arguments. Among the different discursive lines, the focus will be primarily on analyzing narratives and counter-narratives related to the sphere of gender, using examples from Latin America. Through this exercise, we will review and imagine new ways of crafting and circulating messages that defend democracy, diversity, and human rights in general.

Bei Anmeldung unter info-memo@uni-koeln.de erhalten Sie per Email eine vorbereitende Lektüre zugesandt.

Öffentlicher Vortrag und Master Class

Dienstag, 28. Oktober 2025 | 18-19:30 | Seminarraum S14 (Seminargebäude 106)

Amuse Them Without Killing Them: Early Film Exhibition, Fire & Public Health

Diana W. Anselmo (ISCTE Lisbon)

This talk focuses on the social and medical anxieties raised by the fast implementation of film exhibition infrastructures in early twentieth century Europe and United States. Structural failure due to fire became both a hazard and a spectacle in early cinema, with the UK and the US producing many successful "firebug" short films in the early 1900s. Simultaneously, fire became a main feature in shoddily constructed and retrofitted exhibition spaces. Flammable nitrate film, electrical short-circuiting, and overturned gas lamps ignited life-threatening blazes all over American movie houses, echoing previously devastating theater fires in France, US, China, and Portugal. In this talk I discuss how the fear of fire in early movie exhibition relates to a broader understanding of commercial cinema as a threat for public health that went beyond fears of structural failure into fears of airborne disease, female empowerment, democratic access, and social contagion.

Der Vortrag ist öffentlich.

Diana W. Anselmo is a social historian. Her research focuses on film reception in the Progressive Era, gender, sexuality, and affective labor in US media history, and most recently the transcontinental intersections of disasters, built environments, and global medical histories in the long nineteenth century.

Begleitend hierzu:

Masterclass: Letters from the Pacific: Race, Gender & Cultural Exchange in Silent Hollywood Fandom

Mittwoch, 29. Oktober 2025 | 10-11:30 | Fachschaftsraum Medienkulturwissenschaft, Meister-Ekkehard-Str. 11, Raum Nr. 0.11

Comparing the fan letters published in US movie magazines in the 1910s with those fans sent privately to early Hollywood stars, students will be asked to think through issues of gender, race, and cultural exchange taking place across different spheres of knowledge-production: the private and the public, the emotional and the commercial, home and abroad. Framed by a reading, a lecture, and in-class activities, students will learn about negative modes of fan participation forged at the onset of Hollywood's celebrity culture—including vitriol, snark, and tribalism—in order to better understand the long history of hostile patterns of engagement and relationality flourishing in online spaces today.

Bei Anmeldung unter info-memo@uni-koeln.de erhalten Sie per Email eine vorbereitende Lektüre zugesandt.