Department of Germanic Languages & Literatures University of Toronto
You are warmly invited to an academic lecture by Prof. Tobias Hof, DAAD Associate Professor for German Studies and History at the University of Toronto.
Lecture Title:
‘Völkisch Visions’: The Artist Johann Bossard, National Socialism, and the Legacy of an Ideology
Date: Thursday, February 27, 2025
Time: 4:00 PM
Location: Charbonnel Lounge, Elmsley Hall
About the Lecture:
The term ‘völkisch’ has reemerged in German public discourse, fueled by the far-right party Alternative für Deutschland. But what lies beneath this ideology? Through the lens of artist Johann Michael Bossard (1874–1950) and his Gesamtkunstwerk in the Lüneburg Heath (built 1911–1950), the talk explores the origins and worldview of the völkisch movement. It examines not only its ties to and distinctions from National Socialism but also the remarkable endurance of völkisch networks long after the end of World War II.
About the Speaker:
Tobias Hof is DAAD Associate Professor for German Studies and History at the University of Toronto. He was previously the 2022/2023 Hannah Arendt Visiting Chair at the Munk School for Global Affairs and Public Policy at the University of Toronto, DAAD Visiting Professor at the History Department at UNC Chapel Hill and a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Washington University in St. Louis. He received his Ph.D. from the University in Munich in 2009 and his Habilitation in 2018, where he still teaches as a Privatdozent.
His main research interests include the history of fascism, terrorism/antiterrorism, and humanitarianism. He is the author of Staat und Terrorismus in Italien 1969-1982 (Oldenbourg, 2011), Galeazzo Ciano: The Fascist Pretender (UTP, 2021) and Geschichte des Terrorismus von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart (utb, 2022). He is currently working on an edited volume titled Fascist Fantasies: Aesthetics and the Ambivalent Reception of Popular Fiction and Film in the 20th and 21st Century, a book on global food aid for Ethiopia in the 1970s and 1980s, and a monograph tracing the history of global right-wing terrorism since the 19th century. This talk is the culmination of several years of research for the Kunststätte Bossard and the Institute of Contemporary History, Munich-Berlin.
We look forward to welcoming you to this engaging academic talk!
