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Leverhulme Visiting Professor Hans-Thies Lehmann at University of Kent
Drama & Theatre Studies at Kent are pleased to announce that Professor Hans-Thies Lehmann will join us as Leverhulme Visiting Professor from September 2011. Professor Lehmann is one the most distinguished international theatre scholars who made a significant contribution to the study of contemporary theatre and performance practice with his groundbreaking concept of 'postdramatic theatre' (1999; engl. 2006), which has been translated into more than ten languages. Lehmann is also one of the leading international Brecht scholars, and president of the International Brecht Society, as well as a prominent expert on Brecht's disciple Heiner Müller.
Throughout his career, Lehmann has also been involved in theatre practice, working as a dramaturg for internationally renowned directors such as Peter Palitzsch, Jossi Wieler, Christof Nel, and Theodoros Terzopoulos, while also creating his own scenic projects. He was also founder of the 'Frankfurt International Summer Academy', an important international point of exchange between theory and art practice, which most famously fostered the emergence of Jacques Rancière's widely influential lecture on the 'Emancipated Spectator'. With his strong interdisciplinary interests in Continental European philosophy (he also published widely on Hegel and Benjamin), contemporary German literature and film, Lehmann will be able to stimulate and enrich the intellectual life across the Faculty of Humanities throughout his stay.
Professor Lehmann has recently completed his new substantial study on tragedy, and his presence at Kent will provide, far beyond the University of Kent, the opportunity for the transfer of his latest influential and inspiring thinking. He will host a Leverhulme Lecture Series "The End of Tragedy" and contribute, on the topic "Conflict: Playfulness and Tragedy in Contemporary Theatre and Performance", to the MA-T European Theatre.
Professor Lehmann retired from his Chair in Theatre Studies at Johann-Wolfgang-Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main (Germany), in 2010. In the past, he has been a visiting professor at the Universities Paris III (Sorbonne), Paris VIII (St. Denis), Paris X (Nanterre), Kaunas/Lithuania, Krakow/Poland, and the University of Virginia/US and has held a stipend of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science to enable research in Asia. The Leverhulme Visiting Professorship at Kent is his first sustained period of time he will spend at a British University. During his stay, Lehmann will also be accompanied by his partner, eminent Greek theatre scholar Prof. Helene Varopoulou.
With the concurrent presence of Professor Lehmann and Professor Richard Schechner, the department is very thrilled to host two of the most influential international scholars in the field of theatre and performance studies at Kent during Autumn Term 2011.