Papers by Hermann Wittenberg
This essay concerns itself with the pervasive "problem" of plagiarism in student writing, arguing... more This essay concerns itself with the pervasive "problem" of plagiarism in student writing, arguing against the easy adoption of technological policing "solutions" that may themselves contribute to an erosion of authentic learning and knowledge production. The paper critically examines the key tool or weapon in the war against plagiarism, namely the educational software Turnitin, and some of the discontents that has arisen in consequence of its widespread adoptions in academic institutions. The second part of the essay examines practices of literary plagiarism, using the example of Shakespeare and Coetzee to question notions of originality. Both writers, one from the Renaissance, the other from contemporary literature, will serve as illustrative book-ends for the English literary canon as a whole, exemplifying the close relationship between copying and creativity. These ideas are applied to the concept of a "knowledge commons", which is indispensable to the idea of a good university, and which is being crowded out by inflated discourses of plagiarism and an overreach of plagiarism policing in the academy. Lastly, the essay briefly offers a few practical and pedagogic observations.
JLS, 2022
This article re-reads Lauren Beukes's debut novel Moxyland (2008) through an intermedial lens, fo... more This article re-reads Lauren Beukes's debut novel Moxyland (2008) through an intermedial lens, focusing on the text's multiple "nested" references to images, as well as techniques of "braiding" where visual effects are woven into the prose itself. The ubiquitous presence of photography in the novel suggests a pervasive thematic and stylistic visuality, which at times mimics ways of seeing through a camera lens. A key structuring binary in the novel concerns the opposition between two fundamentally different forms of image technologies, namely classical analogue photography and digital imagery. These two different visual modes are keyed to two of the main characters, but are also freighted with aesthetic, ethical, and political consequences. Photographs have classically authenticated the existence of the real world in front of the lens, but in a digital world, the direct connection between image and reality is increasingly tenuous, arbitrary and random, opening up the spectre of totalitarian information control, fake news, and media manipulation, a world in which citizens no longer have any access to truth and pictures no longer tell us what really has happened. Beukes's novel, read through this opposition between analogue photography and digital visuality, is a cautionary tale about a future of images and digital technology, and of the consequences that these shifts in visual media may have on society.
Coetzee and the Archive, 2021
J.M. Coetzee: Photographs from Boyhood, ed. H. Wittenberg, 2020
Extract, pages from editor's introduction
In cultural studies there is an increasing interest in the aesthetic, historical and political di... more In cultural studies there is an increasing interest in the aesthetic, historical and political dimensions of film animation, much of it focused on the prolific output of the Disney corporation (Giroux 1999, Wells 2009) and, more recently, Japanese anime (Napier, 2005). But there is also a recognition of the growing diversity, inventiveness and maturity of a genre that has an increasingly global footprint, and whose cultural significance far exceeds the field of children's entertainment. This chapter will examine a recent South African 3D computer animated children's film, Khumba (2013), as an example of emerging trends in transnational animation film production.
Exhibition catalogue, with "Remembering Photography" (Interview with J.M. Coetzee)
Forthcoming exhibition at the Irma Stern Gallery, Cape Town
25 November 2017 - 20 January 2018
This mini thesis is a survey of recent theories of space which provide a useful and novel perspec... more This mini thesis is a survey of recent theories of space which provide a useful and novel perspective for an interpretation of J.M. Coetzee’s Foe. The notion of space as a social and cultural construct is the basis for an investigation into the spatiality of postmodernity and late capitalism; visual structures such as the picturesque and the panopticon; the ideological dimension of painted and written landscapes; and the structure of colonial spaces. Foe and its intertext Robinson Crusoe are examined in the light of these notions. A further argument seeks to situate colonial spaces within a larger spatial structure, namely that of imperialism. Foe is read as a critical engagement with spatialised structures of power such as imperialism, which seek to establish the dominance of a Western, rational, male subjectivity over colonised domains. It will be argued that novelistic narrative fiction is a key discursive feature of this dominance. Novels are thus complicit with imperialism. Foe’s critique of imperial spatial arrangements therefore takes the form of an intervention in the discourse of the novel: a rewriting of Robinson Crusoe which imaginatively creates a radically different, non-hegemonic space.
Journal of Southern African Studies, 2012
Http Dx Doi Org 10 4314 Eia V38i3 4, 2011
University of the Western Cape) _________________________________________________________________... more University of the Western Cape) ________________________________________________________________________ "If there's an archaeology of the book, then the beginnings are deep under the surface, under the soil." -J.M. Coetzee 1
Using a sharp stone, the Magistrate gouges the outline of a head in a side of the dig. Two pebble... more Using a sharp stone, the Magistrate gouges the outline of a head in a side of the dig. Two pebbles for eyes, another for a nose, a slash beneath the nose for a mouth, and the head is finished.
In an important early study of the relationship between literature and film, Keith Cohen argues p... more In an important early study of the relationship between literature and film, Keith Cohen argues persuasively that the emergence of European modernist fiction in the early twentieth century does not stem solely from a disenchantment with the tired realism of the nineteenth century bourgeois novel. It also drew on the stylistic inventiveness of an entirely new art form: cinema. A "rapidly developing cinematic language" in the early silent film era (Eisenstein, Buñuel, Griffith) fed a similar inventiveness in the novel, catalysing a "dynamic
English Academy Review, Jan 1, 2010
In South African imaginative writing and scholarly research, there is currently an extensive and ... more In South African imaginative writing and scholarly research, there is currently an extensive and wide-ranging interest in the 'Bushman', either as a tragic figure of colonial history, as a contested site of misrepresentation, or even as an exemplary model of environmental ...
Scrutiny2: Issues in English Studies in Southern …, Jan 1, 2010
This article was downloaded by: [66.249.68.2] On: 06 July 2011, At: 10:09 Publisher: Routledge In... more This article was downloaded by: [66.249.68.2] On: 06 July 2011, At: 10:09 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Please note that this is an unrevised student paper.
Please contact me to obtain permission t... more Please note that this is an unrevised student paper.
Please contact me to obtain permission to cite: [email protected] or [email protected]
Spaces and Crossings: Essays on Literature and …
Uploads
Papers by Hermann Wittenberg
Please contact me to obtain permission to cite: [email protected] or [email protected]
Please contact me to obtain permission to cite: [email protected] or [email protected]