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Sonja M. Hotwagner, M.A.
Associate Member
Position
- Ph.D. Candidate
Contact information
Karl Jaspers Centre
Voßstraße 2. Building 4400, Room 118
69115 Heidelberg
Germany
About Sonja M. Hotwagner
Originally from Eastern Austria, Sonja Hotwagner has studied at the University of Foreign Language in Ôsaka and the University of Vienna. She earned a B.A. in Japanese Studies and holds a M.A. in the fields of History of Art, with a minor of Asian Art. She has contributed to various exhibitions, catalogues and databases affiliated with Japanese popular culture esp. woodblock print.
Her research interests have a disciplinary approach, they focus especially on visual material from the Tokugawa and Meiji Period in Japan. As member of the Project B1 "Asian Satire" she is currently pursuing a doctoral degree at the Cluster in Heidelberg on the topic of satirical images and cartoons during the Russo-Japanese War 1904/05.
Projects
Curriculum vitae
born 1982 in Oberwart, Austria
Education
since 09.2008: Team member of the project “Gauging Cultural Asymmetries: Asian Satire and the Search for Identity in the Era of Colonialism and Imperialism” (B1) of the Cluster of Excellence at the Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg, Germany, Ph.D. Candidate
2008: Master degree in History of Art (University of Vienna)
2007: Bachelor degree in Japanese Studies (University of Vienna)
2006 - 2007: Studies at the Osaka University of Foreign Language (Ôsaka gaikokugo daigaku), Japan
2002 - 2008: Studies of Art History and Japanese Studies at the University of Vienna, Austria
Working and Research Experiences
2010: Research trip to Japan (Meiji Shinbun Zasshi Bunko/Tokio, Manga hakubutsukan/Kyôto, etc.)
2009: Research trip to Japan
2008: Member of the FWF project "Ukiyo’e caricatures 1842-1905", Department for East Asian Studies, University of Vienna
2005: Internship im Museum of Applied Art Vienna
Exhibition "Ukiyo-e reloaded" and "Uaaaa!!! Manga"
Person in charge for a database on Ukiyo-e at the Museum of Applied Art/Vienna
2003: Curatorial assistance in the field of Modern Art
PhD-Project
"Sketching Identities. Caricature and Satire in the Age of Russo-Japanese War"
After the forced opening of the country in 1853 under the threat of Commodore Perrys "black ships" and the following Meiji Revolution (1868), Japan underwent a period of drastic change. Modernization after western models and - as a result - the search for its own identity as a nation was one of the main topics the young state had to deal with. Transcultural and transnational flows took place also in the fields of popular culture; the British "Punch" magazine as a blueprint of satirical journalism inspired a range of Japanese artists and sharpened the view for political themes.
Ten years after the surprising triumph over its Asian neighbor China, Japan faced a new enemy in 1904: Russia, one of the formerly admired western powers. Contemporary satire and caricature can be read as a mirror for the struggle for a "national face" and the mode of representation. It is therefore an important source in times of cultural change.
Selected publications
HOTWAGNER (under revision), "'Punch Heirs' between the Battle Lines. Satirical Journalism in the Age of the Russo-Japanese War 1904/05."
"On the Transcultural Aspects of the Satirical Magazine Tôkyô Puck in late Meiji Japan", EAJS Conference in Tallinn/Estland; planned
"Charles Wirgman and Georges Bigot - Satirical border crossers in the Foreign Settlement of Yokohama/Japan", Workshop "The Power of the Image" in Fayoum/Egypt; planned
