Martin Blumenthal-Barby

Martin Blumenthal-Barby, Assistant Professor, joined Rice's German Studies department from Yale University in 2008. He is currently revising his dissertation—Acts of Sovereignty: Müller, Kafka, New German Film, Benjamin, Arendt—for publication, but is already busy starting a new project on film theory and he is working on a new major research project on the relationship between secularization and religion in the European literary and filmic tradition, focusing, among others, on Carl Schmitt, Hans Blumenberg and Jacob Taubes. In the short time since his arrival at Rice, he has already built up an impressive portfolio of film studies courses and he has also started what is to become the department's official film series, Kino Dienstag, which will present a German film—with subtitles, of course—every other Tuesday to the Rice community.