Susanne Christ received her binational doctorate from the University of Gießen, Germany, and the University of Graz. Her work on narrative theory and representations of dementia was supervised by Ansgar Nünning (University of Gießen) and Roberta Maierhofer (C.IAS, University of Graz).
How does it feel to live with dementia? How do those affected and their families experience this illness? What can we learn about our society from how it treats people living with dementia? Literature allows us to examine these questions and to explore others’ life worlds, to adopt new perspectives, and to recognize how little we know about the lived experiences of an illness which are difficult to communicate.
In her thesis, Susanne Christ analyzed four contemporary anglophone literary works regarding their representation of dementia: “Elizabeth is Missing”, “The Story of Forgetting”, “May” and “Still Alice”. For her excellent thesis, Susanne Christ was awarded the University of Graz’ Humanities Dissertation Award 2022 (“GEWI-Dissertationspreis der Uni Graz”) (ex aequo with Dimitri Smirnov). The prize was awarded by the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Graz.
In a podcast recorded by the University of Graz, she talks about how these books represent dementia and how representations change over time and how all of this relates to each and every one of us.
Listen to this podcast: