Heike Hartung Book order

Global mobility is one of the crucial phenomena of our time. Combining the theoretical frameworks of masculinity studies and age studies, the contributors to this volume examine the intersection of cultural exchange, gender and age, exploring ageing masculinities with reference to the key concepts of relationality, kinship and care. The essays analyze transcultural experiences of ageing men from Europe, relationships including the Indian diaspora in the US, Chinese father images in the US-American context and Black British queer kinship, drawing its examples also from Brazilian society and African European contexts.

Do liminal embodied experiences such as illness, death and dying affect literary form? In recent years, the concept of embodiment has been theorized from various perspectives. Gender studies have been concerned with the cultural implications of embodiment, arguing to move away from viewing the body as a prediscursive phenomenon to regarding it as an acculturated body. Age studies have extended this view to the embodied experience of ageing, while drawing attention to the ways in which the ageing body, through its materiality and plasticity, restricts the possibilities of (de)constructing subjectivity. These current debates on embodiment find a strong counterpart in literary representation. The contributions to this anthology investigate how and to what extend physical borderline experiences affect literary form.

Focusing on the interplay of age, gender, and narrative genre, this study reinterprets the Bildungsroman as a 'coming of age' novel while integrating perspectives from age and disability studies. It examines the works of notable authors like Goethe, Austen, and Dickens, and introduces the emerging genre of "dementia narrative." By proposing a fresh theoretical framework for cultural age studies, the book analyzes the relationships among narratology, literary theory, gender, and age, providing valuable insights into literary history.