About

Dr Henschel holds a PhD in German Studies from the University of Cambridge, and a BA and MA in German Literature and Language from Freie Universität Berlin. Dr Henschel has previously taught literature, film, and German language at the University of Cambridge, the University of Warwick, and Cardiff University.

Research Interests

Dr Henschel’s research specialisation lies in 20^th- and 21^st-century literature, film and visual culture from the German-speaking world, with a particular focus on gender and queer theory, aesthetic theory, neuroqueer theory, and disability studies.

Dr Henschel’s current research project, titled ‘Towards a Neuroqueer Aesthetic: Interrogating Neurotypicality in the German Aesthetic Tradition’, critically examines the German Aesthetic Tradition through a neuroqueer lens. The project traces a ‘neurotypical bias’ in key works of aesthetic theory from Kant to Adorno, while challenging this canonical tradition by excavating a ‘neuroqueer aesthetic’. Through analysis of literature, film and visual culture from early modernism to the present, the project demonstrates how artistic expressions can enable a neuroqueer forms of being-in and thinking-of the world. Drawing on Dr Henschel’s concept of ästhetisches Eigenwissen – or aesthetic knowledge in its differential specificity – the project shows how aesthetic forms can instantiate neuroqueer modes of communication, sensation, and cognition, ultimately contributing to the promotion of a neurodiverse sense of the world.

Dr Henschel’s doctoral research examined how socio-historical, material, and discursive transformations in the 21^st-century have reshaped contemporary understandings of kinship. Focusing on contemporary literature and film from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, the project investigated how aesthetic practices negotiate and reimagine normative societal formations across different scales of kinship: the family, the non/human, and queer and trans* ecologies. Dr Henschel developed the concept of ästhetisches Eigenwissen to theorize the intrinsically transformative potential of aesthetic form to instantiate new forms of being-in and knowing-of the world. The project thus contributes to discussions of how aesthetic forms engage with societal transformations in the contemporary moment. Dr Henschel is currently preparing a revised version of the doctoral dissertation for publication under the title ‘New Forms of Kinship in Contemporary Literature and Film from the German-Speaking World’.

Qualifications

PhD German Studies (University of Cambridge)

M.A. German Literature (Free University Berlin)

B.A. German Literature and Language (Free University Berlin)