Roberta Maierhofer

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Roberta Maierhofer (born July 21, 1960 in Graz ) is an Austrian Americanist, cultural scientist and researcher on aging. She teaches at the Karl-Franzens University in Graz and was Vice Rector from 1999 to 2011. Since 2007 she has headed the Center for Inter-American Studies (C.IAS) at the University of Graz. Since 1996 she has also been Adjunct Associate Professor at the State University of New York in Binghamton .

Live and act

Roberta Maierhofer studied English and American studies at the University of Graz and graduated in 1991 with a dissertation on the American writer William Howard Gass . In 2002 she completed her habilitation with an anocritical study of women, aging and identity in American literature. Maierhofer is considered the founder of anocriticism and is one of the leading aging researchers worldwide (Paul Petry Prize for Age Studies, 1998). In her anocritical approach she suggests a differentiation between biological and culturally defined old age - analogous to the English distinction between (biological) "sex" and (cultural) "gender". Following this approach, the binary young - old would be a construct.

In 1999 Maierhofer became Vice- Rector for International Relations at the University of Graz under Rector Lothar Zechlin . His successor Alfred Gutschelhofer expanded her portfolio, making her Vice-Rector for International Relations and Women's Advancement from 2003 to 2007 and Vice-Rector for International Relations and Interdisciplinary Affairs from 2007 to 2011. Maierhofer is a founding member of the European Network in Aging Studies (ENAS). In 2012 she was awarded the title of Professor Honoris Causa from the University of Shkodra in Albania . Maierhofer has been on the advisory board of the Austrian Fulbright Commission since 2010. From 2000 to 2007 she was a member of the Executive Board of the Coimbra Group of the European Union . In 2006, as Vice Rector, as part of the internationalization of the University of Graz, she initiated the Seggau Summer School in Seggau Castle , where academics from Europe and the Americas teach, such as Helga Kromp-Kolb , Marjorie Agosín , Manfred Prisching and Rolando Hinojosa-Smith .

Publications (selection)

  • Feminism and Aging in Literature. In: D. Gu, ME Dupre (ed.): Encyclopedia of Gerontology and Population Aging. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69892-2_253-1 . Springer Nature. 2019. pp. 1–7.
  • Understanding the Americas - Work in Progress as a Balancing Act of Idea and Implementation. In: Yvonne Völkl and Albert Göschl (eds.): Observations - observations on literature and morality in Romania and the Americas. Vienna: LIT, 2019. pp. 271–277.
  • (Un) Comfortably Moving Out of the Comfort Zone: Life as Travel. In: Francescato, Simone, Maierhofer, Roberta, Minghetti, Valeria, Trinkaus, Eva-Maria. (Ed.): Senior Tourism: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Aging and Traveling. Bielefeld: Transcript. 2017. pp. 77-96.
  • The self in the context of life. Considerations for the representation of the life course. In: Konstantin Lindner, Andrea Kabus, Ralph Bergold, Harald Schwillus (eds.): Remembering and narrating: Theological, humanities, human and cultural perspectives. Münster: LIT. 2013. pp. 15–23. ISBN 978-3643122964
  • “To America!” Jewish migrations to the Americas in the 19th and 20th centuries. (Ed. with Kriebernegg, Ulla; Lamprecht, Gerald and Strutz, Andrea) Göttingen: Wallstein, 2012. ISBN 978-3835308862
  • Gerontophobia and Anophobia or The Self in the Other. In: Dietmar Goltschnigg (ed.): Fear - Paralyzing standstill and engine of progress. Tübingen: Stauffenburg, 2012. pp. 127–134.
  • Growing old or dying young: cultural-scientific considerations on the subject of caring relatives. In: Magareta Kreimer, Isabella Meier (ed.): "The relatives know best what is good". An analysis of the family long-term care system and its impact on the situation of family carers. Graz: Grazer Universitätsverlag - Leykam, 2011. pp. 19–38.
  • Transatlantic Relationships in Higher Education: American Studies and the Impact of the Bologna Process (with Kriebernegg, Ulla). In: João Ferreira Duarte, Marta Pacheco Pinto, and Susana Araújo (eds.): Trans / Oceanic, Trans / American, Translation: Issues in International American Studies. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009. pp. 51-62.
  • An Anocritical Reading of American Culture: The Old Woman as the New American Hero. In: Journal of Aging, Humanities, and the Arts. 2007. https://doi.org/10.1080/19325610701410890
  • Salty old women: an anocritical study of women, aging, and identity in American literature. Essen: Verlag Die Blaue Eule, 2003. ISBN 978-3639031386
  • The Unsatisfied Longing: Searching for Order in William H. Gass' Fictitious Theory of Literature. Heidelberg: Verlag Winter, 1993. ISBN 978-3825308568

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ C.IAS team. Retrieved July 21, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Roberta Maierhofer: The unsatisfied longing. Finding order in William H. Gass' fictitious theory of literature. Heidelberg: Winter, 1999.
  3. ^ Roberta Maierhofer: Salty old women: an anocritical study of women, aging and identity in American literature. Essen: Verlag Die Blaue Eule, 2003.
  4. ↑ Anocriticism: A New Approach to Literary and Cultural Studies. interamerikanistik.uni-graz.at, accessed on July 21, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Maierhofer, Roberta
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian Americanist, cultural scientist and aging researcher
DATE OF BIRTH July 21, 1960
PLACE OF BIRTH Graz