Nassim Winnie Balestrini

Nassim W. Balestrini is Full Professor of American Studies and Intermediality at the University of Graz, Austria, where she also heads the Centre for Intermediality Studies in Graz (CIMIG) (https://intermediality-centre.uni-graz.at/en/centre/). Before 2014, she taught at the universities of Mainz, Paderborn, and Regensburg (in Germany) and at the University of California, Davis (USA). Within the fields of US-American and Canadian literature, she is interested in intermediality and adaptation theory, life writing across media, hip hop (particularly rap as poetry and contemporary Indigenous and Alaskan artists), African American literature, and new approaches to the historiography of theater and poetry. Contemplating borders and mobility—be it between nations, cultures, languages, or media—informs much of her research. Since the mid-2010s, climate change theater has played a major role in her research and teaching. In this context, she has been exploring ways of collaborating with artists in order to integrate creative work into literary and cultural studies classroom.

During her time at CLIC, Nassim Balestrini will delve further into climate change theater in order to fathom how playwrights and directors use intermedial features. Areas of inquiry will comprise

(1) the potential of intermediality in fostering a spirit of hope that encourages activism and personal engagement with climate change;

(2) the use of specific media in order to highlight individuals and/or to create a sense of a theatrical commons; and

(3) the potentially innovative role of soundscapes, music, silence, and other sonic features.