The Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages at Oxford is seeking to appoint a one-year postdoctoral research fellow, starting 1 October, to assist with the John-Fell funded project 'Kafka Global'.

Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, 41/47 Wellington Square
Grade 7: £32,817 - £40,322 (with discretionary range to £44,045) per annum

The successful candidate will be encouraged to devise their own independent research project on Kafka, or a related topic in Modernism Studies, as part of the funding application and will be supported in drawing up other applications for follow-on postdoctoral funding.

The project
The centenary of Kafka’s death in 2024 provides a unique opportunity for Oxford to showcase its role as custodian of Kafka’s manuscripts (the majority of which are held at the Bodleian Library) and his global legacy. The centenary will be marked by a major exhibition at the Weston Library, ‘Kafka Global’, which will in turn be accompanied by an ambitious academic and cultural programme. Organised by the Oxford Kafka Research Centre (OKRC) in collaboration with the German Literary Archive Marbach and the National Library of Israel, ‘Kafka Global’ will define Kafka studies for the next generation.

The first stage of this project, funded by the John Fell Fund, will involve preparatory work for the exhibition as well as two academic workshops in the academic year 2021-22, which will feed into a major grant application related to Kafka’s global cultural legacy, coordinated by the Principal Investigator (Professor Carolin Duttlinger) and Co-Investigator (Professor Barry Murnane) (to be submitted in summer 2022). The first workshop will be dedicated to planning the academic programme of the grant application; this will include refining the overarching academic theme (Kafka Global: Life, Death, and Afterlife) and the associated narrative. The second workshop will involve practitioners from theatre, film, dance, literature, and the visual arts, who will help to define the scope and themes of the cultural programme.
Applicants must possess: Fluency to native- or near-native-speaker level in German and an excellent understanding of English; ability to manage their own academic research and associated activities; previous experience of contributing to academic publications/presentations in English or German; excellent communication skills, including the ability to write for publication, present research proposals and results, and represent the project at meetings in English and/or German. Applicants must have obtained a PhD in German Studies or a related area, or must have a submitted their doctoral thesis in this area by 1 September 2021.
The deadline for applications is 12 noon on 20 August. For details, please see the following link: https://my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecruit/erq_jobspec_details_form.jobspec?p_id=152171

Please note that the University of Oxford's retirement policy is changing. With effect from 1 October 2017, all employees at Grade 8 and above will have a retirement age of 68, and all employees at Grades 6 and 7 will no longer have a set retirement age. Further details are available at: www.ox.ac.uk/about/jobs/preemploymentscreening

Vacancy ID : 152171
Contact Email : recruitmentmod-langs.ox.ac.uk