Warum wir das lesen sollen. Für eine Philologie im Zeichen literarischer ‚Veranderung‘

Abstract

The relevance of philological and literary criticism, as it is studied and taught both at universities and schools, has been increasingly called into question. The following essay gives a survey of this dispute as much as it presents a plea for literary studies. Matters under discussion are external upheavals in the history of media and culture as well as the discipline’s internal difficulties. Only an argument in favour of the literary studies that not only examines external motivations but predominantly reveals the intrinsic potential of literary fictions can constitute an appropriate reply to this discussion. Above all, the differential dynamics of alterizing (A. Mahler) inherent in such fictions have to be taken seriously and rendered visible by philological practice.