Research Kevin Absillis

Abstract

In the early years of his career, Flemish composer Peter Benoit (1834-1901) found a lot of inspiration in folk tales. A notable example is the 15-part piano cycle Contes et ballades, which he wrote around 1860. Although he was residing in Paris at the time – or perhaps because of it – the work is filled with memories of his hometown Harelbeke: each part of the cycle is inspired by a folk tale Benoit had encountered in his younger years. At the time, the kind of folk tales Benoit refers to flourished primarily within an oral tradition – stories about, for instance, fictional creatures such as Kludde and the Leiegeest (the ghost of the river Lys) were typically transmitted through speech and through recitation. Delivering a good story must have been a craftsmanship in itself, which was highly valued in society. For the performer of Benoit's music, this is more than just some interesting information: the presence of an oral tradition in this (instrumental) repertoire has an essential impact on the dramatic narrative. In the Contes et ballades, the musician – in this case the pianist – takes the place of a storyteller, reciting the story content to the audience. This project approaches the concept of the musician-storyteller as one of the guiding principles within the historically informed performance of Benoit's music. The research reconnects the repertoire with its understudied context of origin, namely the nineteenth-century oral culture. It focuses on themes at the intersection between spoken and musical recitation: the narrative form, the meaning of the story, the physical act of storytelling, and the influence of historical keyboards. The ultimate goal is not only to make Benoit's music resonate again, but also to have his language spoken again.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

During the First World War (1914-1918), German authorities rolled out a propaganda strategy in occupied Belgium. In an effort to disrupt the Belgian state, they systematically angled for the sympathy of the Flemish part of the Belgian population. Leaning on the notion of Germanic kinship and a profound cultural relationship, the occupying forces presented themselves as a "Brudervolk" assisting the Flemish community to liberate themselves from "francophone oppression". While these efforts may at first have seemed hopelessly contrived – by sowing death and destruction in "poor little Belgium" the occupier had raised much angry blood – eventually the so-called Flamenpolitik did have a major impact on the Flemish movement (Vlaamse Beweging). Influenced by "flamenpolitical" propaganda, radical flamingant groups succumbed to the temptations of a full-fledged nationalism oriented toward autonomous political institutions and with separatist overtones. Whereas various aspects of this Flamenpolitik have already been examined, up until now very little attention has been paid to the remarkable number of German translations of Flemish literature that appeared in this crucial period. By investigating these translations as a form of "cultural transfer," this project will uncover how the German translation policy created support for the consolidation and spread of the "Flamenpolitik" and thus ultimately contributed to the reshaping of the political landscape in Belgium after the war.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Fellow: Burki Ulrike

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

Growing Up Urban is the first in-depth research project devoted to literary constructions of the city in Dutch-language children's books published in Belgium in the early decades of the 20th century, as well as to the contextual, cultural historical factors that informed such constructions. The project analyses 40 urban children's novels, i.e. children's books set in cities that engage with city life, published by the leading, Antwerp-based firm L. Opdebeek in the period 1900-1940. This is a time when European cities were developing and modernizing rapidly and the urban child became a prime focus of societal and cultural engineering for various ideological movements. Inspired by the state of the art, foreign examples and preliminary findings, the project hypothesizes that L. Opdebeek's children's books actively engaged with the city and urban life in Flanders in positive, though complex, ways, and that they used the city to explore discourses of belonging, including questions of Belgian and Flemish identity. It investigates this hypothesis and related research questions through close reading the primary works and contextualizing them in archival material that sheds light on their creators, production, marketing and reception. Growing Up Urban thus sheds light on the entanglement of children's literature with urban discourses and transformative processes of urban modernity in early 20th-century Belgium. It uncovers a body of understudied Flemish books, authors and illustrators and contributes to a better understanding of the role that children's literature played in the Flemish movement. In answering to these research goals, the project calls into question the supposed anti-urbanism among contemporaneous Dutch-speaking Belgians and reassesses the Flemish movement's complex relationship with the nation state of Belgium, modernity and the city, as well as with childhood. Growing Up Urban strengthens existing interdisciplinary research between three research groups at the Faculty of Arts, as well as with prominent external partners in heritage and literature.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Joosen Vanessa
• Co-promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Co-promoter: Van Damme Ilja
• Fellow: Burki Ulrike
• Fellow: Ledegen Louise

Research team(s)

• Antwerp Centre for Digital humanities and literary Criticism (ACDC)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

Historical and cultural research in order to create 'a Flemish canon', funded by Flemish government. Project oriented at primary and secondary schools, as well as at the public sphere (heritage, museums,...). Will result in website, book & podcast-series.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project website

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

The Antwerp author Hendrik Conscience (1812-1883) went down in history as 'the man who taught his people to read'. The catchphrase not only captures the nationalist and didactic ambitions of his literature, but also his popularity among nineteenth-century readers, both in Belgium and abroad. Yet in spite of his reputation as one of the pioneers of Flemish literature, modern scholarly research on Conscience's oeuvre is scarce. We do not know, for example, how his popular stories actually addressed their audiences and which visions of reality they did construct. Without a structural investigation of the rhetoric of these texts in relation to the cultural context in which they were created and circulated, the national and international appeal of Conscience cannot be properly understood. The current PhD-project addresses for the first time a number of fundamental questions about the texts by which Conscience taught a people to read. It investigates how Conscience's novels of manners frame the reader's perception of social reality from a rhetorical perspective. The project pays careful attention to the way different degrees of generalizing reality (forms of exemplarity, cf. David 2010) invite readers to identify with visions on reality that are presented as common, which can be described, following Palmer (2010), as instances of 'social minds' in the analyzed novels. By interpreting and positioning Conscience's narrative techniques in relation to contemporary discourses on the Flemish Movement, the European culture of sentiment, and the advent of realism, this project sheds a whole new light on the position and function of his works within the Flemish and European literary field of the nineteenth century. The project achieves a deeper understanding of Conscience's narrative techniques and their ethical dimensions and reassesses the literary-historical significance of his oeuvre. Its results moreover provide an insight in the ways narrative form and content reflect and at the same time generate the attitudes, discourses, and ways of thinking that make up a culture.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Fellow: De Bont Marlou

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

CATCH 2020 aims to provide a working infrastructure for the computer-assisted transcription of complex handwritten documents. It will do so by building on the existing Transkribus platform for Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) – which allows us to process handwritten textual documents in a way that is similar to how OCR processes printed textual documents.. Rather than producing flat transcripts of digital facsimile images, however, CATCH 2020 will produce structured texts, providing tools to add textual and linguistic dimensions to the transcription by combining the state of the art of the research field of textual scholarship with the state of the art of the research field of computational linguistics.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Van Hulle Dirk
• Co-promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Co-promoter: Daelemans Walter
• Co-promoter: Kestemont Mike
• Co-promoter: Petré Peter
• Co-promoter: Soens Tim

Research team(s)

• Antwerp Centre for Digital humanities and literary Criticism (ACDC)

Project website

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

Literacy with regard to Science Technology Engineering Mathematics (STEM) is considered worldwide to be a key factor in societal growth. Research and education are therefore strongly geared towards fostering STEM literacy. Cultural artefacts for the young, such as children's books, are rarely included in these efforts. That omission is deplorable, because children's concepts of science are not only constructed in schools or museums. Stories and books contribute to children's identity construction, to their worldviews, and to their perception of STEM. Contemporary children's literature is characterized by a great diversity in terms of target groups, genres and literary quality, but science is a recurrent topic. We find scientific themes in popular series, awarded books (in particular in so-called literary nonfiction) and as the focus of the children's book week. The rich array of contemporary children's books offers a varied image of STEM and scientists and can thus counteract the stereotypical image of the male, old and confused scientist that children encounter time and again in popular culture. This research project therefore focuses on contemporary children's books carrying schemes, scripts and metaphors related to STEM, in order to assess their potential contribution to STEM-education and to reflections on science and scientists. Based on theories and models from cognitive sciences, we analyze a corpus of children's fiction and nonfiction for children aged 6 to 14, published in 2000-2015. First, we map the diversity of scientists as characters in the children's books. In addition to the importance of gender that is highlighted in STEM-education, we also draw attention to age, social class, race, and physical and mental abilities. Second, we explore the narratological features that are used to address children as budding scientists. Crucial is the concept of scientific agency, that is the way in which STEM is shown to increase (or limit) the power and opportunities of growth for the characters. Next, we analyze how children's books teach scientific knowledge and skills and how they cast the relationship between science and society. In the course of this analysis, we focus on recurrent scripts, such as the Eureka experience, or the Frankenstein plot. This project is the first to apply models from cognitive poetics to children's literature about STEM. In addition, it is unique in studying both fiction and non-fiction for children, and exploring a corpus of contemporary Dutch-language children's literature that has been neglected by literary scholarship. Finally, in connecting STEM education and literary scholarship, this project aims to have a significant social impact.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Co-promoter: Joosen Vanessa
• Fellow: Pauwels Frauke

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project website

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

Language has in Belgium always been the object of conflict. Not simply between its French and Dutch speaking communities, but also within Flanders, a fierce debate has been devoted to language norms. Advocates of strict conformity to northern Dutch prevailed, but compliance with this norm has not always run so smoothly. This prompted investments to promote Standard Dutch, which gradually developed into a process that linguists today are beginning to recognize as 'hyperstandardisation'. It is in this climate that Hugo Claus (1929-2008) starts experimenting with a language that openly mixes Standard Dutch with Flemish dialects; the author himself dubbed it 'Claus-language'. While Claus is one of the most investigated Flemish authors, his language is still beset with many ambiguities. This research will systematically investigate the language variation in the prose of Claus, how it fits with the author's poetics and why Claus felt the need to 'invent' a new language. It will also examine how this 'Claus-language' may have affected linguistic debate in Flanders, especially the discussion concerning the so-called 'tussentaal' ('interlanguage'). Through combining linguistic and literary research methods and, more in particular, through using a number of methods derived from international stylistics research, this proposal does not only address a gap in Claus studies, but also stimulates interaction between linguistic and literary research on a theoretical and methodological level.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Absillis Kevin
• Fellow: Lemmens Wendy

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

This research project aims at reconstructing the systematic 'translation' into Standard Dutch -- or 'Dutchification' -- of literary texts written by Flemish authors between 1945 and 1970.

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Humbeeck Kris
• Fellow: Absillis Kevin

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project

Abstract

Researcher(s)

• Promoter: Jacobs Katrien
• Co-promoter: Absillis Kevin

Research team(s)

• Institute for the Study of Literature in the Low Countries (ISLN)

Project type(s)

• Research Project