Periodic Reporting for period 1 - TACOMO (Transatlantic Cowgirl Mobilities and the Western Show)
Reporting period: 2020-09-01 to 2022-08-31
TACOMO addressed female cowboy performers at Buffalo Bill’s Wild West in Austria and Germany and sought to integrate this research into present-day Austrian popular cultures. It explored how showwomen performed cowboydom and American girlhood, how they interacted with European gender norms, and how they coined the figure of the US cowgirl. TACOMO communicates the gendered quality of the Wild West and the importance of gender roles at the heart of national myths to Europeans in the here and now. TACOMO has shown that the Wild West was created as gendered performance that persists into our present day, with the objective to help Europeans understand better the key role gender plays in today’s transatlantic relationship and in everyday popular culture through a topic that is easily accessible and that posits agency and self-determination as key narratives of how to be a cowgirl. TACOMO’s method to attain these objectives included a strong public outreach and academic networking strategy that benefitted the general public as well as academic audiences, specifically students at UVienna (specifically future teachers of English and early career scholars in American and Canadian Studies). The objective was to equip these students as discussants in cultural and gender studies and in the history of nationalism and popular culture in Europe. For the researcher, individual objectives included publishing research, building an international professional network, and applying and interviewing for professor positions to reach the professional goal of a tenured professorship.
Publications:
Edited collection (peer reviewed): Ladies in Arms. Women, Guns and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture. Ed. Teresa Hiergeist and Stefanie Schäfer. Bielefeld: transcript 2024 (in preparation)
Research article (peer reviewed): Cowgirling in Thuringia: The German Police Procedural Tatort goes Western. In “ Ladies in Arms. Women, Guns and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture”, ed. Teresa Hiergeist and Stefanie Schäfer. Bielefeld: transcript 2024 (submitted)
Research article (peer reviewed, OA): “Grief became my friend, my work”: Mary Todd Lincoln’s Uneasy Union with Memory in LeAnne Howe’s Savage Conversations (2019). in: New American Studies Journal, special issue:“Women and Service in the long 19th Century“, ed. Isabella Heinz, Kristeena Lute, Julia Nitz, Sandra Petrulionis, Esther Wetzel. forthcoming.
Research article/book review (peer reviewed, OA): “The Donald, FLOTUS, and the Gendered Labors of Celebrity Politics at 1600, Pennsylvania Avenue.” Amerikastudien/American Studies, special issue “Common Grounds? Transatlantic Perspectives on the State of American Democracy”, ed. Cedric Essi, Heike Paul, and Boris Vormann, 66.1 (2021): 302-307.
Handbook articlea/contributions to "De Gruyter Handbook the American Short Story" (2022); "The Lexicon of Global Melodrama" (2022), and “Blackwell Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Fiction, 1980-2020" (2022)
Professional coaching and training
Sept 2022 participation 3-day workshop organized by Vienna’s Equal Opportunities office, UVienna
Project-related peer review and monitoring for TACOMO: regular project presentations at UVienna's research colloquiua (Mobility Studies and American Studies), Jan 2021, Mar 2022
Dr. Schäefer's Canadian Studies initiatives: mentoring, promotion, teaching
Since Oct 2020 executive director, Centre for Canadian Studies, UVienna
Jun 2023 organization Vienna Lecture of Canadian Studies, speaker: Prof. Andrea Davis
Mar 2023 guest lecture: "Return of the Bison? Canadian Literature meets Indigenous Futurism in Chelsea Vowel’s Buffalo is the New Buffalo (2022)", Canadian Studies Centre University of Innbsruck
Sept 22-Feb 23: teaching BA seminar "Girlhood in North American Literature"
Jul 2022 organization “Vienna Lecture in Canadian Studies”; guest: Madeleine Thien
Aug 2022 Workshop “Teaching Canadian Studies” at ESSCS, University of Innsbruck
May 2021 organization and hosting Vienna Lecture of Canadian Studies; guest: Dr. Helene Vosters (McMaster)
Mar-Jul 2021 teaching: MA seminar “Teaching postcolonial and Canadian Studies” (20 students enrolled)
Oct, 2020 guest lecture “Women Writing the Canadian Frontier”, lecture course “Journeys in North American Prose and Poetry, 1492-2022” (taught by Prof. Alexandra Ganser)
Co-organizer, First European Summer School in Canadian Studies, Jul-Aug 2022, Vienna and Innsbruck (https://canada.univie.ac.at/esscs/(opens in new window))
The ESSCS brought 20 MA and grad students from disciplines including, English, American, French and Media Studies, and History and Social Sciences, for a two-week program of lectures and workshops on Canada and international networking (6ECTS).
Student mentoring and teaching
Thesis supervision at University of Vienna: 13 BA theses and 4 MA theses
Edited collection (peer reviewed): Ladies in Arms. Women, Guns and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture. Ed. Teresa Hiergeist and Stefanie Schäfer. Bielefeld: transcript 2024 (in preparation)
Research article (peer reviewed): Cowgirling in Thuringia: The German Police Procedural Tatort goes Western. In “ Ladies in Arms. Women, Guns and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture”, ed. Teresa Hiergeist and Stefanie Schäfer. Bielefeld: transcript 2024 (submitted)
Research article (peer reviewed, OA): “Grief became my friend, my work”: Mary Todd Lincoln’s Uneasy Union with Memory in LeAnne Howe’s Savage Conversations (2019). in: New American Studies Journal, special issue:“Women and Service in the long 19th Century“, ed. Isabella Heinz, Kristeena Lute, Julia Nitz, Sandra Petrulionis, Esther Wetzel. forthcoming.
Research article/book review (peer reviewed, OA): “The Donald, FLOTUS, and the Gendered Labors of Celebrity Politics at 1600, Pennsylvania Avenue.” Amerikastudien/American Studies, special issue “Common Grounds? Transatlantic Perspectives on the State of American Democracy”, ed. Cedric Essi, Heike Paul, and Boris Vormann, 66.1 (2021): 302-307.
Handbook articlea/contributions to "De Gruyter Handbook the American Short Story" (2022); "The Lexicon of Global Melodrama" (2022), and “Blackwell Encyclopedia of Contemporary American Fiction, 1980-2020" (2022)
Professional coaching and training
Sept 2022 participation 3-day workshop organized by Vienna’s Equal Opportunities office, UVienna
Project-related peer review and monitoring for TACOMO: regular project presentations at UVienna's research colloquiua (Mobility Studies and American Studies), Jan 2021, Mar 2022
Dr. Schäefer's Canadian Studies initiatives: mentoring, promotion, teaching
Since Oct 2020 executive director, Centre for Canadian Studies, UVienna
Jun 2023 organization Vienna Lecture of Canadian Studies, speaker: Prof. Andrea Davis
Mar 2023 guest lecture: "Return of the Bison? Canadian Literature meets Indigenous Futurism in Chelsea Vowel’s Buffalo is the New Buffalo (2022)", Canadian Studies Centre University of Innbsruck
Sept 22-Feb 23: teaching BA seminar "Girlhood in North American Literature"
Jul 2022 organization “Vienna Lecture in Canadian Studies”; guest: Madeleine Thien
Aug 2022 Workshop “Teaching Canadian Studies” at ESSCS, University of Innsbruck
May 2021 organization and hosting Vienna Lecture of Canadian Studies; guest: Dr. Helene Vosters (McMaster)
Mar-Jul 2021 teaching: MA seminar “Teaching postcolonial and Canadian Studies” (20 students enrolled)
Oct, 2020 guest lecture “Women Writing the Canadian Frontier”, lecture course “Journeys in North American Prose and Poetry, 1492-2022” (taught by Prof. Alexandra Ganser)
Co-organizer, First European Summer School in Canadian Studies, Jul-Aug 2022, Vienna and Innsbruck (https://canada.univie.ac.at/esscs/(opens in new window))
The ESSCS brought 20 MA and grad students from disciplines including, English, American, French and Media Studies, and History and Social Sciences, for a two-week program of lectures and workshops on Canada and international networking (6ECTS).
Student mentoring and teaching
Thesis supervision at University of Vienna: 13 BA theses and 4 MA theses
Progress of publications:
Edited volume: "Ladies in Arms. Women Guns, and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture": , co-edited with Teresa Hiergiest.OA publication; Bielefeld: transcript 2024. Under contract/in progress.
Monograph: "Horses, Guns, and Shows: Western Culture and the Making of the Cowgirl in the Transatlantic World" (WT), in preparation
expected impact socio-economic and societal implications:
1. for Canadian Studies initatives and mentoring activities:
-bringing students into conversation with Canadian Studies Scholars, fostering transatlantic networks and intellectual exchange (see specifically Vienna Lectures in Canadian Studies, European Summer School in Canadian Studies)
-educating future English teachers in Austria as discussants about national cultures; development of MA theses PhD projects in the fields of Gender Studies, Mobility Studies; enabling students and early career scholars to work academically and engage societal debates around gender scripts, Western myhts and settler colonial narratives; see specifically two MA thesis i n progress (submission dates planned for the ed of 2023), on the topics of a) Food Sovereignty b) Austrian Western shows at Winzendorf and Wagram
2. for academic audiences and for the general public: the book publications "Ladies in Arms" and "Horses, Guns, and Shows" will capture contemporary popular culture phenomena and educate readers about gender scripts, equal opportunities, and feminist questions for the present moment. Specifically under the impression of Russia's ongoing war against Ukraine, a critical evaluation of nationalist gender scripts, homophobia, and gun cultures (military and civil) marks an important contribution to reinforcing and defending European values, democracy, and the importance of working towards equal opportunities for all.
Edited volume: "Ladies in Arms. Women Guns, and Feminisms in Contemporary Popular Culture": , co-edited with Teresa Hiergiest.OA publication; Bielefeld: transcript 2024. Under contract/in progress.
Monograph: "Horses, Guns, and Shows: Western Culture and the Making of the Cowgirl in the Transatlantic World" (WT), in preparation
expected impact socio-economic and societal implications:
1. for Canadian Studies initatives and mentoring activities:
-bringing students into conversation with Canadian Studies Scholars, fostering transatlantic networks and intellectual exchange (see specifically Vienna Lectures in Canadian Studies, European Summer School in Canadian Studies)
-educating future English teachers in Austria as discussants about national cultures; development of MA theses PhD projects in the fields of Gender Studies, Mobility Studies; enabling students and early career scholars to work academically and engage societal debates around gender scripts, Western myhts and settler colonial narratives; see specifically two MA thesis i n progress (submission dates planned for the ed of 2023), on the topics of a) Food Sovereignty b) Austrian Western shows at Winzendorf and Wagram
2. for academic audiences and for the general public: the book publications "Ladies in Arms" and "Horses, Guns, and Shows" will capture contemporary popular culture phenomena and educate readers about gender scripts, equal opportunities, and feminist questions for the present moment. Specifically under the impression of Russia's ongoing war against Ukraine, a critical evaluation of nationalist gender scripts, homophobia, and gun cultures (military and civil) marks an important contribution to reinforcing and defending European values, democracy, and the importance of working towards equal opportunities for all.