Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Konstantin Helm (pronouns: they/them) is a researcher, lecturer, and PhD candidate at the Department for English and American Studies at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. They studied English and information science at HU Berlin, the University of Manchester and Università Ca'Foscari in Venice and hold an MA in English Literatures from HU.

As research assistant for the chair for British Cultural Studies and Cultural History, Konstantin is working on a PhD project on how governmental policy and related sociopolitical developments of the 1980s and 2010s influenced distinct strategies of representing and organising space in British cultural production.

Konstantin is also contributing to the project "Queer Theory in Transit: Reception, Translation, and Production of Queer Theory in Polish and German Contexts" (QueerIT), funded by DFG and NCN. Formerly as a doctoral and presently as an associate researcher, they are working on feminist receptions of queer theory in Germany as well as digital queer media.

Research fields:

• British cultural studies, history, and theory
• Queer and trans* studies
• Temporality and spatial practice
• Identity politics
• History of ideas

Courses:

• SoSe 2025: Haunted Space(s) in 1980s British Literature
• WiSe 2024/2025: Introduction to British Cultural Studies and Theory
• SoSe 2024: Cultural Anxieties in Late Victorian Novels
• SoSe 2023: Addiction: An Interdisciplinary Approach (Projekttutorium)
• SoSe 2021 – WiSe 2021/2022: Fictionality, Narrativity, Identity (Projekttutorium)

Talks, Panels, and Events Organised

• November 2024: Presentation of PhD Project as part of the Postgraduate Forum at BritCult 2024, University of Innsbruck
• September 2024: Presentation at the “Queer Theory in Transit” Workshop at HU Berlin, Paper Title: “Performance Review: Early Reception of Queer Theory by German Feminist Academics”
• May 2024: Presentation at the “Queer Theory in Transit” Workshop at the University of Warsaw, Paper Title: “Unqueering Feminism: Gender-Critical Rhetoric in EMMA”
• May 2024: Presentation at the Workshop “Gender in Northern European Literature” at HU Berlin, Paper Title: “Authenticity and Embodied Identity in Abigail Thorn’s ‘Identity: A Trans Coming Out Story’”
• June 2023: Presentation at the Workshop “Autobiographical Writing and the Gestalt of Shame” at HU Berlin, Paper Title: “’This is not a performance:’ Shame and Confession in Abigail Thorn’s ‘Identity: A Trans Coming Out Story’”
• October 2022: Presentation at SEDERI Junior II at the Autonomous University of Madrid, Paper Title: “Gold and Guilt: Credit and Intrinsic Value in Jonson’s The Alchemist and Lyly’s Midas”
• July 2022: Co-organised graduate symposium “Disclosure: New Perspectives on the ‘Confessing Animal’” at the JFK Institute, FU Berlin; Paper Title: “Trans* is Truth – Elliot Page’s Coming Out and the Language of Confession”
• February 2022: Presentation at MasterVision 2022 at Universität Bremen (Online Conference), Paper Title: “’Not Rivers, Towers of Blood:’ Memorial Archives and the Grenfell Tower Fire”
• WiSe 2021/2022: Ran “Study Group Literary Theory“ with final workshop with Prof. Madhavi Menon, Ashoka University (funded by HUG)

Sprechzeiten während des Sommersemesters:

Mi 12.00 - 13.00 Uhr

Terminvereinbarungen für die Sprechstunde per Email: helmkonx@hu-berlin.de