Patricia Melzer

Patricia Melzer

  • College of Liberal Arts

    Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures

    Associate Professor and Department Chair

    Programs
    • Gender, Sexuality and Women's Studies
    Concentrations
    • German

    German Faculty Advisor

    Affiliated Faculty

    Programs
    • Global Studies
Office Location

Mazur Hall, 537 (Chair Office) and 641

Expertise

Feminist and queer theories and cultural texts, Women in radical social movements in Germany

Biography

Patricia Melzer is Associate Professor of German and Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies at Temple University. In 2013-14 she was a Mellon Regional Faculty Fellow at the Penn Humanities Forum at the University of Pennsylvania. Her research focuses on feminist and queer theories and cultural texts, and women in radical social movements in Germany. Her first book Alien Constructions: Science Fiction and Feminist Thought was published by Texas University Press in 2006 and since then her work has appeared in journals such as International Feminist Journal of Politicsand Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies. Her second book Death in the Shape of a Young Girl: Women’s Political Violence in the Red Army Faction, examines the participation of women in the left-wing terrorist groups RAF and Movement 2nd June in the 1970s and 1980s. The book focuses in particular on the implications of women’s political violence for feminist theories of violence. It was published by New York University Press in 2015.

Curriculum Vitae

Website

Selected Publications

  • "Death in the Shape of a Young Girl’: Feminist Responses to Media Representations of Women Terrorists During the ‘German Autumn’ of 1977.” International Feminist Journal of Politics 11:1 (March 2009): 35-61 Melzer-IFJP
  • “Maternal Ethics and Political Violence: The ‘Betrayal’ of Motherhood among the Women of the RAF and 2 June Movement.” Seminar: A Journal of Germanic Studies 47:1 (February 2011): 81-102
  • Melzer-Seminar Alien Constructions; Science Fiction and Feminist Thought, A probing examination of how science fiction literature and film has presented feminist debates about difference, globalization, and techno science. January 2006

Courses Taught

Undergraduate 

  • GERMAN 0868 German Society in Literature and Film
  • GERMAN 1001, 1002, 1003: Introduction to German I, II, III
  • GERMAN 2041: Reading I
  • GERMAN 3221 German Culture Through Film
  • GERMAN 4140 Seminar in Special Topic
  • GSWS 3722 Women and Political Violence
  • GSWS 2051 Critical Race Theory and Feminist Implications
  • GSWS 2002/LGBT 2400 Sexual Difference in the Cinema
  • GSWS 3236 Gender and Technology in Popular Culture
  • GSWS 3000 Topics in Women’s Studies
  • GSWS/LGBT 2405 Gay and Lesbian Lives
  • Introduction to Women’s Studies
  • Living for Change: Narratives of Women in Radical Social Movements
  • International Women’s Writing
  • Border Crossings: Gendered Dimensions of Globalization
  • Foundations in Women’s Studies
  • Feminist Theory - Queer Theory Graduate Courses
  • GSWS 8001 Introduction to Feminist Studies
  • GSWS 9991 Seminar in Feminist Research