Verena Berger, born in Vienna, Austria, in 1962. Ph.D. from the University of Vienna. Senior Lecturer of Hispanic Studies at the University of Vienna.
Fellow (1 September 2013 – 30 June 2014)
TRANSNATIONAL GENRE CONVENTIONS: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF NARRATIVE AND VISUAL REPRESENTATIONS OF IDENTITY IN WORLD CINEMA´S ROAD MOVIES
Project Description
My research project aims to produce a comparative analysis of film genre conventions in Road Movies. Frequently understood as films that typically represent American culture, the narrative of travel “on the road” has been adapted by film-makers of many national cinemas across the world. As a modern audio-visual continuation of the literary tradition of initiation journeys, these films generally use the metaphor of a trip with a search for individual and/or national identity. Based on the historical consideration of the Road Movie as a genuinely US-American genre (Cohan/Hark; Sargeant/Watson; Laderman; Frasca; Benoliel/Thoret), this project focuses on a corpus of films from Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East. The research will be guided by mixed-methods practice, combining film genre theory, transnational and transcultural studies.
Selected Publications
1) Berger, Verena/Komori, Miya (Eds.): Polyglot Cinema: Migration and Transcultural Narration in France, Italy, Portugal and Spain. Vienna: LIT, 2010.
2) Berger, Verena: “Lorca, muerte de un poeta: Eine spanische TV-Miniserie als Erinnerungstext” (Biography and Collective Memory in the Spanish TV-Series Lorca, muerte de un poeta), in: Türschmann, Jörg/Wagner, Birgit (Eds.): TV global. Medien, Fernsehen, Fernsehformat, Fernsehserie, Talkshow (Global TV. Medias, Television, Series, Talkshow). Bielefeld: Transcript, 2011, 239-259.
3) Berger, Verena: “ ‘Accented Co-Production’: ‘Kleines Tropicana/Tropicanita y Hacerse el sueco como cine cubano transnacional” (Little Tropicana and Playing the Suede: Transnational Cuban Cinema), in: Bellón, Emilio Ángel/Satarain, Mónica (Eds.): X Jornadas de Estética del Cine y Teorías Cinematográficas (X Symposium of Cinematographic Aesthetics and Theories). Buenos Aires: UBA, 2013, 229-253.