Queer Theory in Transit: Reception, Translation, and Production of Queer Theory in Polish and German Contexts

《中转酷儿理论》致力于研究人文学科中的酷儿理论，重点是文化和文学研究。自20世纪90年代以来，美国对异性恋规范性和酷儿理论产生的批评在欧洲各学科形成和制定酷儿理论方法方面发挥了重要作用，以至于当地产生的概念和先例经常被忽视。这个项目的重点是波兰语和德语的翻译和接受，以及对酷儿理论的贡献。它解决了这一理论在美国学术界的起源与随后在非常不同的地理、政治和文化背景下的接受、适应和挪用之间的紧张关系，并使之富有成效。以波兰和德国为例，追溯和比较两国在历史特殊性的支配下采用、修改和抵制的关键过程。这包括更仔细地检查美国的观点和知识生产是如何与当地的理论传统联系和整合的，以及它们是如何影响正在进行的酷儿理论的当地生产的，因为它是在回应当地的讨论和问题时出现的。这一研究设置将首先使我们能够强调这两个欧洲国家之间的相互联系和分歧，其次，发展对美国文化霸权的批判性观点，历史上，波兰和德国对美国文化霸权的看法非常不同，最近，随着欧洲政治格局的变化，在更全球化的框架下，这一观点更普遍地成为一个有争议的问题。该项目引用了爱德华·赛义德关于旅行理论的讨论，强调了在形成和应用理论概念时当地语境的重要性。近20年来，德国和波兰在酷儿理论领域进行了积极的交流，从21世纪初开始举行联合会议并出版出版物。如果酷儿理论被理解为包括可追溯到现代主义甚至更远（例如在性学领域）的批评和文学先例，那么这种跨文化和学术对话就会进一步延伸到过去。自从酷儿理论在20世纪80年代后期形成并在20世纪90年代和21世纪初传播到德国和波兰以来，根据当前的理论表述来识别这些先例已经成为可能。此外，酷儿理论在两国的迅速发展，需要对该领域的翻译和本地工作进行比较分析。《转运中的酷儿理论》将对正在进行的关于全球化背景下知识生产的辩论做出贡献，并批判性地审视源自美国的文化概念的主导地位。

Queer Theory in Transit is dedicated to queer theory in the humanities, with an emphasis on cultural and literary studies. Since the 1990s, critiques of heteronormativity and queer theory production in the US have been instrumental in forming and formulating queer theoretical approaches in various academic disciplines in Europe to a point that locally produced concepts and antecedents were often ignored. This project focuses on Polish and German translations and receptions of, as well as contributions to queer theory. It addresses and makes productive the tension between the origins of this body of theory in US-American academia and its subsequent reception, adaptation and appropriation in very different geographical, political and cultural contexts. It takes the example of Poland and Germany to trace and compare the key processes of adoption, modification and resistance governed by the historical specificities in these two countries. This includes a closer inspection of the ways US-American perspectives and knowledge production have been linked to and integrated in local theoretical traditions and how they have affected the ongoing local production of queer theory as it emerges in response to local discussions and issues. This research set-up will firstly allow us to stress interconnections and divergences between these two European countries and, secondly, to develop a critical perspective on US-American cultural hegemony that historically has been viewed very differently in Poland and Germany and that in recent times has more generally become a debated issue with changing political landscapes in Europe and in a more global framework. The project calls on Edward Said’s discussion of traveling theory, which strongly emphasizes the importance of local contexts in formulating and applying theoretical concepts. Germany and Poland have had a robust exchange in the realm of queer theory for almost two decades, holding joint conferences and issuing publications since the early 2000s. And this intercultural and academic dialogue extends much further into the past if queer theory is understood to include critical and literary antecedents that date back to Modernism and beyond (e.g. in the area of sexology). Since the formulation of queer theory as a field in the late 1980s and its transit to Germany and to Poland in the 1990s and 2000s, it has become possible to identify those antecedents in the light of current theoretical formulations. Moreover, the rapid uptake of queer theory in the two countries invites a comparative analysis of the translations and local work in the field. Queer Theory in Transit will contribute to the ongoing debate about knowledge production in a globalizing context and critically examine the dominance of cultural concepts emanating from the US.