Ingvild Folkvord

Ingvild Folkvord is a professor in the Department of Language and Literature at NTNU, Norway. Her research focuses on modern German and Norwegian writers and Ernst Cassirer's philosophy of culture. Her work on cultural theory has led her to consider literature as a collective resource in response to the terrorist attacks (Stemmene etter 22. juli [Voices after July 22] (Scandinavian Academic Press, 2020). She is currently working on a monograph in English on literary responses to the terrorist attacks in Europe after 9/11.

The project

Title: After the trials

Judicial trials are crucial steps when modern societies are trying to come to terms with terrorist attacks. And yet trials are not processes that can settle the matter of justice once and for all. In her book "Faces of Injustice" philosopher Judith Shklar draws our attention to a broader social understanding of justice by distinguishing between "validated injustice" and other forms og injustice that do not "match the rule-gouverned prohibitions" (Shklar 1990). In this respect trials can be seen as a necessary, but not sufficient condition for justice, They constitute an interval in a broder social dynamics in which literature also plays a part. What this part can be and what literature can do is precisely what I investigate in this book that will be published by "Scandinavian Academic Press" in November 2025. Contrary to trials the aim of literature is not to reach a final decision that will be enforced by public constraint, but to shed light on what is still to reflect upon and maybe even contribute to reparation. I analyse a selection of literary texts from three different national traditions, from Norway, France and Germany, texts related to the terror attacks in Oslo and Utøya 2011, the Charlie Hebdo-attacks of 2015 and the attacks that were carried out by the terrrorist cell "Nationalsozialistischer Untergrund" (NSU) in various German cities between 2000 and 2007. This diversity aims at introducing several degrees og variation; between languages and judicial traditions, as well as between literary genres and ways to proceed once judicial justice has been done.

Hosting institution: Centre Georg Simmel. Recherches Franco-Allemandes en Sciences Sociales - EHESS

Selection of publications

2022 «Law and literature as symbolic forms. Bearing witness of contemporary terrorist attacks», in: E. Bengtson et al (red): Shadows in the Cave, Retorikförlaget.

2020 Stemmene etter 22. juli [The Voices after July 22], Scandinavian Academic Press.

2020 «The fear of ‘das Volk’: Karl Ove Knausgård’s reactions to terrorism», i: Scandinavian Studies, 92, Nr. 3. 

2013 «Sachlichkeit, Pathos und strategisches Manövrieren. Bertolt Brecht liest sein Gedicht ‚An die Nachgeborenen‘», in: treibhaus. Jahrbuch für Literatur der 1950er Jahre, 9).

2012 Ernst Cassirer on Form and Technology: Contemporary Readings (edited together with A. S. Hoel), Palgrave Mac Millan.