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Preparation for a Workshop
Reem Almannai
Helen and Emilie invited me to Ennenda, Switzerland, in September 2023 to join a wwa Erntezeit Workshop around “Being A Stranger”. I was already familiar with wwa and its associated digital platform: a database in the form of a homepage that has gradually grown over time. Although I had even written an annotation a while ago, I openly admit that I had neither extensively nor intensively engaged with the platform, and preparation for the workshop compelled me to immerse myself in it. The wwa homepage is based on a differentiated mechanism that is not immediately obvious and requires a moment’s patience from the user at the beginning to comprehend it. It took me a while to understand how the database of texts is set up and what its potential is. As soon as the meaning of the colour code of blue, green, and yellow or the different terms for categorizing the contributions becomes clear, it is very easy in the first step to create diverse links between entries and to follow a very personal path of one’s own interests. Through the glossator, one has the impression of entering into dialogue with the respective authors, even though it is in reality a one-sided conversation speaking outwards.
Dates
Texts and Annotations from 1942 to 2022
Themes
Capitalocene
Critique
Domesticity
Feminism
Food
Learning
Motherhood
Shared space
Ways of thinking
Women as architects
Publication Types
Anthology
Book
Book chapter
Essay
Authors
Arundhati Roy
Elizabeth Bowen
Frida Grahn
Silvia Federici
Tomris Uyar
Publisher
edition assemblage
Volume
Yaz Düsleri / Düs Kısları
Annotation
Yagmur Kültür on Kuskus
10 April, 2023
I felt disturbed and uneasy when I first read the short story ‘’Kuskus’’ . I even felt the need to stop for a while to think about what was disturbing me. The harsh exposure of the domestic spaces, the questioning of family structures, and the very intimate and ruined mother-daughter relation were not usual themes that I come across.
‘’Kuskus’’ is a story of domestic spaces: the kitchen of the main character (the ‘’mother’’), an indirect narration about the household of the ‘’daughter’’, and a little glimpse of the main character to the exterior (to the neighbour’s rubbish bin). This glimpse only aims to reveal a clue about what happens in the house of the ‘’neighbour’’ that the main character does not have access to. By doing so, Tomris Uyar plays with interiors, exteriors, and thresholds as in-between spaces of privacy.
It was unsettling to realize that the mother and the daughter not only accept and internalize the prescribed roles of women in the family unconditionally but also criticize each other on whether their roles are portrayed and responsibilities are fulfilled in a ‘’right’’ or ‘’acceptable’’ manner.
Annotation
Gerard Carty on Seven Winters
17 October, 2022
In Seven Winters (1942), the city of Dublin, where Elizabeth Bowen spent her early years, appears as a reflection, a translation of the felt experience of a seven year old, now in mature years, piecing together the characters of the city, its form and colour where
the tense distances that one only slowly demolished gave a feeling of undertaking to any walk. Everything in this quarter seemed outsize. the width of the streets, the stretch of the squares, the unbroken cliff like heights of the houses made the human idea look to me superhuman. And there was something abstract about this light, with its built up planes of shadow and light*
This small book, almost like a childrens’ story book, captures the character of the house where she was born and first lived, the neighbourhood and its public buildings, characters that are domestic and intimate, civic and monumental, that were her constant companions as an only child. Her description of the terrace house, its piano nobile of social rooms overlooking the Grand Canal, a relatively new piece of city infrastructure at its door, her attendance at the church of St Steven (the pepper canister, where she was baptised) feature, as does the portico of the church facing west, holding the grand axis along Upr. Mount St leading to Merrion Sq. and on to what was then the Royal Dublin Society, (RDS). Formerly, a grand city residence, Leinster house later became the Irish parliament. She describes her fond memories of walks there with her father, traversing its Palladian inspired halls and onwards to Grafton St. a busy premier shopping street of the city. This city derive is now unavailable to Dubliners, but must have made a striking imprint on the mind of the embryonic writer reflected in more mature years. The physicality of Dublin, its plain grain of brick faced houses set alight by the evening sun, the russet and deep orange on summer evenings made a profound impression to the extent that it provoked a necessary description in Seven Winters, as childhood reflection, deeply imprinted of that city;
on such days, Dublin appeared to seal up sunshine as an unopened orange seals up juice. the most implacable buildings were lanced with light; the glass half-moons over the darkened front doors glowed with sun that, let in by a staircase window, felt like a cascade down flights of stairs*
* both quotes taken from Seven Winters – Memories of a Dublin Childhood
Annotation
Adhrita Roy on Pandemic Is a Portal and Azadi
13 July, 2023
“Our town and megacities began to extrude their working-class citizens like so much unwanted accrual.”
Arundhati Roy, The pandemic is a portal.
The pandemic was a lesson for everyone. The enforced lockdown on countries worldwide brought to light a myriad of stories. While some were hopeful, others were tales which were devastatingly sad. In India – while there were stories of stunning, clear skies; instances of Nature healing itself – while people with financial stability used their time at home to reacquaint themselves with hobbies they had long forgotten or spend time with family, re-establishing bonds which today’s age of technology seems to weaken so easily; tried learning new skills and familiarized themselves with shifting their mode of work to an online platform – that was not the case for everyone. If you ask the people from my country – many would probably say they remember the stories of the millions of migrant workers who found themselves without work and without a place of refuge within the first few weeks of lockdown in India. Several might say they had been a part of it.
With steep economic inequalities in the country; people from smaller towns and villages often migrate to cities to look for work. Away from their families for months – they would return during the holidays or a few other times a year – bearing with them funds to help sustain their households. These were the people the lockdown left stranded – in the middle of metropolitan cities, far away from their homes with barely any public transport available to help them undertake the journey back home. Arundhati Roy, in her article – ‘The pandemic is a portal’ has vividly narrated the effects the lockdown had on the country; illustrating the events which led to the sudden call for lockdown in a country having a population of more than a billion.
Subject to hunger, thirst, exposed to the elements, and still walking – they also had to deal with issues such as State borders being closed and thus having no way to head on to their homes. Had to deal with the repercussions which come along with breaking the curfew. Many died on their way home. Even while the stories of the migrant workers flooded television screens; stories of hospitals being overwhelmed by the number of patients and being forced to turn people away started making headlines, rising death tolls and severe lack of medical equipments scared the population of the country – there were other stories too. Tales of people seeing whales near Bombay High, return of river dolphins to the Hoogly River in Kolkata and spotting dolphins in coastal areas. As Arundhati Roy puts it so eloquently – the pandemic was a chance for us to re – evaluate our societal and economic machinery. There were lessons to be learnt – not to be forgotten. To let things, turn back completely to the way they were – would be to not acknowledge the despair the pandemic put people through; so instead maybe we could try to start with small changes and then aim higher.
“…we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it.”
Arundhati Roy, The pandemic is a portal.
Glossary
The following themes have been noted as being present in the citations in your collection.
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by
Christian Crevels
Eric Crevels
The term ‘Capitalocene’ represents a critical attempt to advance from the notion of ‘Anthropocene’. Popularized by climate change debates, the term anthropocene describes a geological epoch in which human activity is currently the main driving force behind the global environmental transformation. Its use faces criticism, however, as the term fails to address the discrepancy in the relationships between different human cultures and the biosphere, attributing the phenomenon to a vague, undifferentiated notion of humanity. On the other hand, the idea of capitalocene recognizes that the environmental state of affairs is not a general consequence of human activity, but a specific result of a material culture fostered by the capitalist mode of production, globalized through the mould of Western industrial society. Therefore, it highlights the geopolitical origins of the crisis, as well as its economic nature, demonstrating the asymmetrical powers and the class struggles behind and within environmental conflicts.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
If art criticism is the analysis and evaluation of works of art, could architectural criticism be applied to specific buildings, or is the subject of critique much wider? It depends on the limits of the term architecture – which can flood into all realms of life and even be described, when freed from canonical definition, as including instances of human intervention for the purposes of living. So, if art criticism is framed by theory, as an interpretive act involving the effort to understand a particular work of art from a theoretical perspective and to establish its significance in the history of art, what could architectural criticism be? Of all the words in the glossary, critique raises the questions of why and who for? the most strongly.
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by
Helen Thomas
This important word is laden with implications, since it is often associated with the cult of domesticity developed in the U.S. and Britain during the nineteenth century that embodies a still widely-influential value system built around ideas of femininity, a woman’s role in the home, and the relationship between work and family that this sets up. When conventional boundaries of what and who constitutes a family are questioned, so too is this fixed definition of domesticity. Within writings about architecture, this extends to the physical and spatial qualities of the domestic interior, and their socio-political meanings as they change over time and geography.
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by
Annmarie Adams
Domesticity refers generally to life at home, often with connotations of togetherness and family. The most common examples of domestic architecture are houses and housing, though other building types sometimes include residential associations to communicate explicit messages about care and comfort. Long-standing symbols of domesticity are pitched roofs, chimneys and fireplaces, and fragrant kitchens, though these vary across cultures and geographie. Domesticity has been a focus for many feminist scholars, due to its close association with women and motherhood.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
The central tenet of this powerful word is a belief in the social, economic, and political equality of women, and it is in this general sense that it has been applied as a thematic term in this annotated bibliography. While this is a clear statement, many complexities are embodied with the ambiguity of its terms, as well as the history of its struggle. As a descriptive term, it has been broken down into various categories which vary with the ideological, geographical and social status of the categoriser. For example, feminism is sometimes assigned chronological waves or stages: from the 1830s into the twentieth century – women’s fight for suffrage, equal contract and property rights; between 1960 and 1990 – a widening of the fight to embrace the workplace, domesticity, sexuality and reproductive rights; between 1990 and 2010 – the development of micropolitical groups concerned with specific issues; and the current wave of feminism that draws power from the me-too movement, and recognises the fluidity of biological womanhood.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
This word overlaps with other themes in this glossary – with domesticity and the sourcing, storing and preparation of food, or sustainability in a wider political and economic sense that embraces the perceived responsibilities of individuals and communities alike to produce and consume food in response to global issues of climate change, biopolitics and economic disparity, for example. As such, the definition extends out from its descriptive relationship to the objects of consumption into spatial realms of all scales.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
Learning is a most difficult term to describe – perhaps considering it as a noun is a good place to start, as a quality that exists in relation to a body of knowledge – they have been learning so they are learned, they are a person of learning, that quality of erudition all scholars supposedly seek. The question that women writing architecture asks in relation to this idea of learning is: what if the body of knowledge, by nature relatively static and only slowly changing and then preferably in relation to itself, does not have defined boundaries (as a canon, or a hegemonic structure for example) but is a state of disintegration and transformation that allows outside, perhaps totally alien, contradictory, disruptive or just not from the same medium, field or reference pool in, as equivalents? In this messy place, what does learning as a verb mean, does it rely on a consensus, an attitude, and, or, a relationship to the world? In practice, the texts to which this term are attached don’t really ask these questions, yet.
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by TACK / Communities of Tacit Knowledge: Architecture and its Ways of Knowing
Tacit knowledge, described in 1966 by Michael Polanyi as what we ‘can know but cannot tell’, often denotes knowledge that escapes quantifiable dimensions of research. Much of architecture’s knowledge resides beneath the surface, in nonverbal instruments such as drawings and models that articulate the spatial imagination of the design process. Awareness of the tacit dimension helps to understand the many facets of the spaces we inhabit, from the ideas of the architect to the more hidden assumptions of our cultures.
From: Lara Schrijver, Margitta Buchert, Angelika Schnell, Tom Avermaete, Christoph Grafe, The Tacit Dimension: Architecture Knowledge and Scientific Research, 2021
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by
The Alternative School of Economics
As an ‘alternative school’, Ruth Beale and Amy Feneck [The Alternative School of Economics] set out to learn together, collaboratively, in a non-hierarchical way. This is a social practice and form of pedagogical critique, questioning ideas through conversations and relationships. They use diverse and creative methodologies, and collaborate with experts from a variety of disciplines, from sociologists to writers. By studying economics through the lens of day-to-day reality and personal experience, they tackle what are often perceived as difficult subjects.
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by
Christine Tohmé
Around 2003, some friends and I were obsessed with the idea of creating a model of education that could complement the traditional structures that are still present in the city. Some of these friends became the first curriculum committee […] “What Elements of academia were you trying to avoid?” The stultifying frameworks, the same old codes of what you need to learn and unlearn, and the set way of doing things in a chronological way. Rather, I see the history of art as a dispersed, volatile structure that can start or happen anywhere.
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by
Estelle Gagliardi
Motherhood can be defined as the state or experience of being a mother, characterised by the biological, social, and emotional roles associated with raising, nurturing, and guiding offspring. This role involves care-giving, providing physical and emotional support, and ensuring the development and well-being of children within a familial or societal framework. It is both a biological function—rooted in reproduction—and a cultural role, shaped by societal norms and expectations. It also happens to be that, in non-western contexts, motherhood is not only centred on the individual relationship between a mother and her biological child. Instead, it is often understood as a communal or collective responsibility. For instance, the concept of Othermothering challenges the Western idea of the nuclear family and the notion of the biological mother as the sole primary caregiver. The relevance of motherhood to architecture lies in its impact on the design, but mainly, the use of space. In communal contexts, where motherhood is shared among extended networks, spaces are often designed to support collective care-giving — courtyards, communal kitchen and multi-generational housing. In societies emphasizing the nuclear family, domestic spaces often prioritize privacy and individualisation, reflecting on the centrality of the biological mother in care-giving.
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by
Maggie Nelson
I have been reading The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson. In her layered writing she reveals and proposes many commentaries and realities of motherhood, some well known, others treading new ground. These two quotes reveal just two of her perspectives:
‘D. W. Winnicott: Sometimes mothers find it alarming to think that what they are doing is so important and in that case it is better not to tell them. It makes them self-conscious and then they do everything less well… // As if mothers thought they were performing their ordinary devotions in the wild, then are stunned to look up and see a peanut-crunching crowd across the moat.”
‘You, reader, are alive today, reading this, because someone adequately policed your mouth-exploring … we don’t owe these poeple (often women, but by no means always) anything. But we do owe ourselves (Winnicott:) an intellectual recognition of the fact that at first we were (psychologically) absolutely dependent, and that absolutely means absolutely. Luckily we were met by ordinary devotion.’ [found by Helen Thomas, written by Maggie Nelson]
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by Tisch Zwei Verein Ennenda Lunchtime Workshop, July 2023
A principal condition of living in a large settlement, a city, for example, is the possibility of anonymity, which requires any collective space – both interior and exterior – to be shared by strangers. During the workshop, we discussed the ways in which the term ‘shared space’ breaks down the distinction between private and public, which has permeated discourse around the city and urban space since the 18th century.
The concept of ‘shared space’ also bypasses the focus on functional definitions of spaces, neighbourhoods, districts and regions. Shared space embodies the prevailing power structures defined by economic, political and social factors that produce the multiple and different realities of its users – for some threatening, or controlled, for others welcoming, comfortable, unseen. So, rather than being a qualifier of functional or dysfunctional inhabitation, it is an acknowledgement of the layers of meaning that a shared space can have, ultimately in any settlement, whether a village or a city.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
First gathering philosophical texts by women, especially those dealing with frameworks for testing how knowledge is constructed, this term now embraces other texts. These might be referring to thinking leading to acting in a transgressive way, or at least perceived such in a hegemonic context. Another important set of texts, which are also included often within spectra and in this sense questioning what this difficult term includes and doesn’t include, are those engaging with neurodiversity and typicality.
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by
Women Writing Architecture
At present, this category gathers together texts that are about women who are practicing and producing as architects, largely in a conventional – building buildings – sense, but including some questioning of what architectural practice is. Some texts consider the role of women in the architectural profession as a whole, which varies in different countries and regions.
[{"page_number":"3","note":"If you browse the homepage, you will quickly and often come across Silivia Federici; she is mentioned or discussed a total of 8 times. I admit I did not know her before. The complicated long title expresses a relevance of the topic for us today; both socially and for me personally in my current life situation. I wanted to find out more about the insights contained in the underlying, politically left-wing theses.\r\n\r\n\r\n***\r\n\r\n\r\nSt\u00f6bert man auf der Homepage so st\u00f6\u00dft man schnell und oft auf Silivia Federici; sie wird insgesamt 8-mal erw\u00e4hnt oder besprochen. Ich gebe zu ich kannte sie vorher nicht. Der kompliziert lange Titel dr\u00fcckt eine Relevanz des Themas f\u00fcr uns heute aus; gesellschaftlich wie auch f\u00fcr mich pers\u00f6nlich in meiner aktuellen Lebenssituation. Davon wollte ich mehr erfahren welche Erkenntnisse in den zugrunde liegenden der durchaus politisch linken Thesen stecken.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"4","note":"At first I thought of the Moroccan national dish and was surprised to learn that Tomris Uyar is Turkish. The annotation of Yagm\u00fcr Kult\u00fcr, which I had the pleasure of getting to know during the workshop, makes you curious about a Turkish literary figure that was previously unknown to me. As long as you don't speak Turkish, you will still be deprived of her work. The books have not yet been translated.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n***\r\n\r\n\r\nDa musste ich erst an das marokkanische Nationalgericht denken und wurde \u00fcberrascht, dass Tomris Uyar T\u00fcrkin ist. Die Annotation von Yagm\u00fcr Kult\u00fcr, welche ich wiederum w\u00e4hrend der Workshops kennenlernen durfte, macht einen neugierig auf eine bis dato f\u00fcr mich unbekannte literarische Figur der T\u00fcrkei. Solange man des T\u00fcrkischen nicht m\u00e4chtig ist, wird einem ihr Werk auch noch vorenthalten bleiben. Die B\u00fccher sind bis heute nicht \u00fcbersetzt.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"5","note":"Gerard Carty (director at Grafton Architects ) has compiled his own collection for Elisabeth Bowen, the author of Seven Winters; it contains only works by Bowen. This was enough to arouse my interest in who is behind this name.\r\n\r\n\r\n***\r\n\r\n\r\nGerard Carty hat f\u00fcr Elisabeth Bowen, der Autorin von Seven Winters eine eigene Collection zusammengestellt; darin sind ausschlie\u00dflich Werke von Bowen enthalten. Das gen\u00fcgte um mein Interesse, wer sich hinter diesem Namen verbringt, zu wecken.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"6","note":"Who knows Lu Wenyu? I didn't know her. But she has met the same fate as Denise Scott Brown, whom at least and rightly almost everyone knows. The scandal is the same. Just like Denise, she was denied the award and recognition of her proven co-authorship by the jury of the prestigious Pritzker Prize and only awarded to her husbands. The Scott-Brown \/ Venturi case dates back to 1991. Well, one could say, as bad as that is, it is after all more than 30 years ago and 20 years after the introduction of women's voting rights in Switzerland. In the case of the Chinese office Amateur Studio by Lu Weny and her partner (the sole Pritzker Prize winner) Wang Shu, we are talking about 2012.\r\n\r\n***\r\nWer kennt Lu Wenyu? Ich kannte sie nicht. Aber ihr ist dasselbe Schicksal zu teil geworden wie Denise Scott Brown, die zumindest und zu Recht fast alle kennen. Der Skandal ist der gleiche. Die Auszeichnung und W\u00fcrdigung ihrer nachweisliche Co-Autor*innenschaft wurde ihr genauso wie Denise von der Jury des renommierten Pritzker-Preises versagt und jeweils nur ihren M\u00e4nnern zugesprochen. Der Fall Scott-Brown \/ Venturi datiert auf 1991. Gut k\u00f6nnte man sagen, so schlimm das ist, es liegt immerhin \u00fcber 30 Jahre zur\u00fcck und 20 Jahre nach Einf\u00fchrung des Frauenwahlrechtes in der Schweiz. Im Falle des chinesischen B\u00fcros Amateur Studio von Lu Weny und ihrem Partner (dem alleinigen Pritzkerpreistr\u00e4ger) Wang Shu sprechen wir vom Jahr 2012.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"7","note":"Also recommended in this context: the little podcasts by WWA. Helen and Emilie had a conversation with editor Frida Grahn. Episode No.3. Perhaps a conversation with Lu Wenyu would be a logical follow-up.\r\n\r\n\r\n***\r\n\r\n\r\nAuch empfehlenswert: die kleinen Podcasts von WWA. Helen und Emilie haben mit der Herausgeberin Frida Grahn ein Gespr\u00e4ch gef\u00fchrt. Episode Nr.3. Vielleicht w\u00e4re ein Gespr\u00e4ch mit Lu Wenyu eine logische Folge.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n***\r\n\r\n\r\nThe global success of the novel \"God of Small Things\" is my point of connection with the Kerala-born writer Arundhati Roy. I was not yet twenty when the book was published, and I did not understand everything then. Keywords like multi-religious society, power relations between classes, injustices of the Hindu caste system, rights of women and of oppressed classes in 20th century India, burned themselves into my mind. These themes continue to haunt Roy today as a political activist. They are issues we, as part of the society of the global north, are increasingly confronted with and therefore cannot be dismissed as a purely Indian phenomenon.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"8","note":"Den Welterfolg des Romans \u201eGott der kleinen Dinge\u201c ist mein Ankn\u00fcpfungspunkt mit der aus Kerala stammenden Schriftstellerin Arundhati Roy. Ich war noch keine zwanzig als das Buch erschien und ich habe damals nicht alles verstanden. Schlagworte wie multireligi\u00f6se Gesellschaft, Machtverh\u00e4ltnisse zwischen Klassen, Ungerechtigkeiten des hinduistischen Kastensystems, Rechte von Frauen und von unterdr\u00fcckten Schichten im Indien des 20. Jahrhundert, brannten sich mir ein. Dieses Thema verfolgt Roy auch bis heute als politische Aktivistin. Themen denen wir uns an vielen Stellen immer mehr auch im globalen Norden konfrontiert sehr und daher nicht als rein indischen Ph\u00e4nomen abzustempeln.","endnote":false},{"page_number":"13","note":"Helen und Emilie haben mich im September 2023 zum WWA-Erntezeit Workshop \u201eBeing A Stranger\u201c nach Ennenda eingeladen. Ich kannte WWA und die dazugeh\u00f6rige digitale Plattform, eine \u00fcber die Zeit sukzessiv immer umfangreicher werdende Datenbank in Form einer Homepage, bereits und habe vor l\u00e4ngerer Zeit auch schon eine Annotation geschrieben. Ich gebe aber offen zu, dass ich mich weder umf\u00e4nglich noch intensiv mit der Plattform auseinandergesetzt hatte. Die Vorbereitung auf den Workshop hat mich daher dazu gebracht es zu tun und mir die Zeit f\u00fcr ein Eintauchen in die Plattform zu nehmen.\u00a0\r\n\r\n\r\nDer Homepage von WWA ist eine differenzierte Mechanik hinterlegt, die sich einem nicht im ersten Moment erschlie\u00dft und die von der jeweiligen Nutzer*in zu Beginn einen Moment Geduld abverlangt sie zu erfassen. Ich brauchte auch einen Moment, um zu verstehen, wie die Datenbank der Literaturkritik angelegt ist und welche Leistungsf\u00e4higkeit ihr inne wohnt. Sobald sich die Bedeutung des Farbcodes von blau, gr\u00fcn und gelb oder die unterschiedlichen Begriffe f\u00fcr die Kategorisierung der Beitr\u00e4ge erschlie\u00dft, ist es im ersten Schritt sehr leicht vielf\u00e4ltige Literaturverkn\u00fcpfungen zu erstellen und ein ganz pers\u00f6nlichen Pfad der eignen Interessen verfolgen. Am Ende hat man den Eindruck in Dialog mit den jeweiligen Kritiker zu treten, obwohl alles online und statisch ist.","endnote":true}]