Martin Dawson
- Visiting Assistant Professor of German
- Office Location
- 425 Lattimore Hall
Office Hours: Monday and Wednesday 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. and by appointment
Biography
Martin Dawson received his BA in German and music at the College of Charleston, SC and PhD in German studies from the joint program of Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His dissertation examined the lyric and short prose works of Joseph von Eichendorff, Annette von Droste-Hülshoff, and Eduard Mörike.
Dawson's research examines the critical potential of these lyric and prose works of the mid-nineteenth century and explores how the poetic thematization of the past through objects and locations like architectural ruins, graves, fossils, and photographic technologies can disrupt teleological temporal tendencies associated with the scientific, technological, and industrial developments of the nineteenth century.
He has taught courses on eco-critical perspectives in German and European literature and philosophy, articulations of love in German-language music and literature, 18th-21st century German literature, and German-language fairy tales. He most recently published an article on the role of fossils in Mörike’s poetry in the November 2023 issue of Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies.