‘Entrenched Narratives, Hidden Figures: Reappraising Representations of War Across German Screen Media’ 

 21-22 March 2024 

The University of Warwick 

 Keynote Speakers 

Dr Maya Figge (Independent Scholar) – ‘Screening War: Colonial Erasure in German War Films’

Dr Christopher Homewood (University of Leeds) – ‘Women at War with the State: German Cinema and the Red Army Faction'

In February 2022, German chancellor Olaf Scholz gave a speech to the German parliament in response to and denunciation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Describing the moment as a ‘turning point’, Scholz referred to Putin’s act of aggression as a watershed moment that altered geopolitical reality and announced a volte-face in Germany’s defence and energy policies. This conference adopts the contemporary moment, which also sees the reality and spectre of armed conflict across parts of the Global South and most recently, Israel's bombardment of Gaza in response to the Hamas attacks of October 7th, as an inflection point for reconsidering representations of war across a range of screen media: from narrative cinema to moving image installation; streaming to VR. It aims to understand the complexities of screening – and watching – war from critical perspectives in Film and Screen Studies that have emerged/gained in importance in recent years: including, but not limited to transnational approaches, intermedial studies, sound studies and media archaeology. We also seek to draw attention to practitioners who foreground contestations of conventional gender and sexual identity; highlight the experience of racialized and colonized subjects otherwise expunged from official historical records; and explore (post)migrant and diasporic narratives of those fleeing war. This conference thus seeks to revise established narratives and illuminate hidden figures in the representations of war across German-language screen media. The conference is kindly supported by the BAFTSS Special Interest Group Funding Scheme, the Association for German Studies Conference Grant, and the Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst (DAAD) 'Forging German Connections' programme. 

For further information, including registration & conference programme, please see the websiteLink opens in a new window. The conference is free to attend.