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Dr. Konstantin Butz

Assistant professor cultural studies / pop and subcultures
+49 221 20189 - 310
k.butz@khm.de

Konstantin Butz has studied American Studies and Cultural Studies at the University of Bremen and at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He completed his dissertation as a scholarship holder of the a.r.t.e.s. Research School at the University of Cologne in 2011. In his doctoral thesis he conducts an analysis of the subculture of American skate punk (>>>>). Since October 2012 he is assistant professor in the department of Art and Media Studies at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (research focus: popular culture and subcultures).


Publications


MONOGRAPH:


  • Grinding California – Culture and Corporeality in American Skate Punk. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. >>>>


EDITED BOOKS / ANTHOLOGIES:


  • Hardcore Research: Punk, Practice, Politics. Bielefeld: transcript, 2023 (Ed. with Robert A. Winkler). >>>>


  • In the Making: An Investigation into Creation in Art, Design, Architecture and Technology. Cologne: Verlag der Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln, 2022 (Ed. with Georg Trogemann). >>>>


  • Jack Halberstam—No Church in the Wild \ Art, Anarchy, Queers. Cologne: Verlag der Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln, 2020 (Ed. with Heike Ander and Anneka Metzger). >>>>


  • Urbane Poesie: Ende und Aktualität der Litfaßsäule. Cologne: Herbert von Halem Verlag, 2020 (Ed. with Heike Ander and Hans Ulrich Reck). >>>>


  • Skateboard Studies. London: Koenig Books, 2018 (Ed. with Christian Peters). >>>>


ARTICLES | ESSAYS | INTERVIEWS | REVIEWS:


  • »Always Already a Playground: Skateboarding and the Unlimited Potential of the City«. Urban Playgrounds: Athletes Claim Cities Around the World. Eds. gestalten & Benevento. Berlin: gestalten, 2022. >>>>


  • »The Ephemeral Beachscape: Skateboarding and the Appropriation of Suburban Concrete«. Narrating and Constructing the Beach. Eds. Carina Breidenbach et al. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2020. 426-438. >>>>


  • Interview in aspeers: emerging voices in american studies 13 (2020). >>>>


  • »Wearing Western Shirts: A Fiction of American Style«. Revisiting Style in Literary and Cultural Studies: Interdisciplinary Articulations. Eds. Jasmin Herrmann, Moritz Ingwersen, Björn Sonnenberg-Schrank, and Olga Tarapata. Berlin: Peter Lang Publishing, 2019. 207-218. >>>>


  • »Smooth Surfaces«. Muse Magazine #54, California Travel Art Issue (December 2019). Essay in English with an Italian translation. 242-253.


  • »Where is my mind?« Text for the catalogue POINTS LINES PLANES by artist Christina Kramer. Cologne: Verlag Bernd Detsch, 2019. 101-110.


  • »Das Chaos im Kopf von Jim Morrison«. Bild, Kunst, Medien: Resonanzen auf das Denken von Hans Ulrich Reck. Eds. Stefanie Stallschus and Bernd Ternes. Köln: Herbert von Halem Verlag, 2018. 36-41. >>>>


  • »›Erwachsene Männer, die Skateboard fahren‹ – Exemplarisches und Kritisches zu Männlichkeit und Skateboarding. Skateboarding zwischen Subkultur und Olympia: Eine jugendliche Bewegungskultur im Spannungsfeld von Kommerzialisierung und Versportlichung. Eds. Jürgen Schwier and Veith Kilberth. Bielefeld: transcript, 2018. 125-142.  >>>>


  • »Vom Blicken und Bauen: Stefanie Plutas ›Urban Peep Show‹«. Text for the exhibition catalogue of artist Stefanie Pluta's Time Capsule / Urban Peep Show. Köln: Strzelecki Books, 2018. >>>>


  • »Backyard Drifters: Mobility and Skate Punk in Suburban Southern California.« Skateboard Studies. Eds. Konstantin Butz and Christian Peters. London: Koenig Books, 2018. 88-107.


  • »The Authenticity of a T-shirt: Ryan Gosling, Roddy Dangerblood, and the Rebellious Genealogy of Thrasher Magazine« Rock Music Studies 4,1 (London: Routledge 2017). 47-56. >>>>


  • »The Promise of Potentiality« – A Response to Dan Goodley. Culture – Theory – Disability
    Encounters between Disability Studies and Cultural Studies.
    Eds. Anne Waldschmidt, Hanjo Berressem, Moritz Ingwersen. Bielefeld: transcript, 2017. 98-102. >>>>


  • »Falling & Slamming« Issues Magazine #2 (Tel Aviv: DIY, July 2017). 19-26. >>>>


  • »›Coolonialismus‹ – Wie das Skateboard nach Schleswig-Holstein kam.« Pop. Kultur & Kritik (Bielefeld: Herbst 2014). 162-173. >>>>


  • »Playground of the Undead: Zu Joscha Steffens gleichnamigen Fotoserie.« Journal der Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln #1 (October 2014). p. 20.


  • »The Art of Failure.« Interview with Prof. J. Jack Halberstam. Off Topic #5 (February 2014). 44-51. >>>>


  • »Pauses and Interludes: The Subcultural Vigor of ›Doing Nothing‹«. Catalog contribution for the exhibition Pause – Computer Games and Cultural Contingencies at the Temporary Gallery Cologne. Curated and edited by Thomas Hawranke and Karin Lingnau. Köln: November 2013.


  • »Akademisches Wellenreiten.« Review of Kristin Lawler's The American Surfer – Radical Culture and Capitalism. Pop. Kultur und Kritik. March 2013. >>>>


  • »Backyard Drifters: Mobility and Skate Punk in Suburban Southern California.« Pirates, Drifters, Fugitives: Figures of Mobility in the US and Beyond. Eds. Heike Paul, Alexandra Ganser, Katharina Gerund. Heidelberg: Winter Verlag, 2012. 175-194. >>>>


  • »How to... surf concrete(ly).« Off Topic #4 (January 2013). 113-115.


  • »The Californian Safety Pin – Excerpts from a Journey to the Origins of Skate Punk.« HUCK Magazine #25 (March/April 2011). 58-64. >>>>


  • Interview with Steve Alba and Lance Mountain. The Skateboard – The Good, the Rad, and the Gnarly: An Illustrated History. Ed. Ben Marcus. Minneapolis: Voyageur Press, 2011. 160-162. >>>>


  • »Bewegung als Präsenz – Über die Kunstwerke von Christina Kramer« (with Corinna Kühn). Catalog contribution for the exhibition 'Präposition' by the artist Christina Kramer at the A.R.T.e.s. Galery in Cologne. Cologne: A.R.T.e.s. Galery, November 2010. 5-7. 


  • »Rereading American Hardcore: Intersectional Privilege and the Lyrics of Early Californian Hardcorepunk.« aspeers #1 (Leipzig: April 2008). 131-158.


TRANSLATIONS


  • (German > English)


  • »Concrete Carving on the Berlin Wall: Skateboarding in East Germany« by Kai Reinhart. Skateboard Studies. Eds. Konstantin Butz und Christian Peters. London: Koenig Books, 2018. 130-150.


  • »Reclaim Your City: Skateboarding and Do-It-Yourself Urbanism« by Christian Peters. Skateboard Studies. Eds. Konstantin Butz und Christian Peters. London: Koenig Books, 2018. 200-216.


Lectures / Workshops


  • »The Ephemeral Beachscape: Surfing, Skateboarding, and the Appropriation of Suburban Concrete«. Paper at »The Stoke Sessions: An International Conference on the Culture, History and Politics of Surfing and Skateboarding« of the Surf/Skate Studies Collaborative at San Diego State University in San Diego, USA, April 22, 2023. >>>>


  • »›We're all just bodies in space‹: Skateboarding as a Queer Practice.« Paper at the international conference »Metropolita Masculinities: Narratives of Gender and Urban Space« at Ruhr-Universität Bochum, November 29, 2019.


  • »The Western Shirts of Marty, Jack, and Ennis: A Textile Take on America’s Most Sacred Genre«. Paper at the annual meeting of The German Association for American Studies »U.S.-American Culture as Popular Culture« at the University of Hamburg, June 15, 2019.


  • »›2 Second Manual‹ – Vom Skateboard zum Klang.« Lecture at the festival »Acht Brücken. Musik für Köln« at Kölner Philharmonie, Cologne, May 09, 2019.


  • »Surfing the Asphalted Beach: Maritime Voyages through Spaces of American Concrete« Paper at the international conference »Narrating and Constructing the Beach« of the Graduate School Language & Literature – Class of Literature (Ludwig-Maximilians University Munich) at the Amerikahaus München, June 15, 2018.


  • »Grinding California: skateboarding y hardcore punk en la decada de 1980.« Lecture in English with simultaneous translation in Spanish. ›Conferencias de las Artes‹ at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá, Colombia, September 29th, 2015.


  • »Safety Pins and Swimming Pools: Skateboarding and Punkrock In 1980s California.« Opening Lecture for the ›Salon Seminar Lectures‹ of the Cultural Studies Ph.D. Programms at Trent University, Peterborough, Canada, September 9th, 2014.


  • »Wie das Skateboard nach Schleswig-Holstein kam.« Lecture in the ›Subkultur‹-Series at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, July 9th, 2014.


  • »Bikinis, Zombies, and Wild Riders of Boards: Thrasher Magazine and Skateboard Journalism in the 1980s.« Paper at the international Conference "American Rock Journalism" at the University of Siegen, March 1st, 2014.


  • »Today’s Empires, Tomorrow’s Ashes: Über das Spannungsfeld von Hegemonien und Subkulturen« Workshop at the Summer Acadamy of the Cusanuswerk. Franz-Hitze Haus, Münster, July 2014.


  • »The Grind of the Voice.« Paper at the first international conference of the European Sound Studies Association at Humboldt-University Berlin, October 4th, 2013.


  • »Producing a Suburban Seascape: Teenage Appropriations of (the) American Concrete.« Paper at the conference ›Urban Popcultures‹ in Prague, May 14th, 2013.


  • »Safety Pins & Swimming Pools.« Lecture at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, April 11th, 2013.


  • »›The Promise of Potentiality‹: Thoughts on Critical Disability Studies – A Response to Professor Dan Goodley.« Response Paper at the conference ›Contact Zones: Culture, Disability, Theory – Encounters between Disability Studies and Cultural Studies‹ at the University of Cologne, October 26th, 2012.


  • »Intersectionally Considered: The Californian Skate Punk Body.« Paper at the Department of Comparative Literature at the University of California, Irvine, March 13th, 2010.

  • »Kunst und Wissenschaft im Dialog.« Chair at an interdisciplinary discussion with artists and academics. A.R.T.e.s. Galery in Cologne, December 2nd, 2010.


  • »The Californian Body in Rebellion.« Paper at the Bavarian America Academy in Munich, May 11th, 2009. 


  • »Divided We Skate - United We Fall: The ›Coolonial‹ Habits of Skateboarding.« Paper at the Graduate School of North American Studies in Berlin, June 28th, 2008.


  • »Zirkuläre Aneignungs- und Inszenierungspraktiken privilegierter Jugendlicher: Kalifornische Subkulturen in transatlantischer Bewegung.« Workshop contribution at the University of Hamburg, January 26th, 2008.  


  • »Rereading American Hardcore: Intersectional Privilege and the Lyrics of Early Californian Hardcorepunk.« Paper at the Post-Graduate-Forum of the DGfA an der Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg, November 4th, 2007. 


Teaching


  • Planning — Structuring — Writing. Workshop for Doctoral Candidates (SuSe 2021).


  • Hardcore (1981/2021). Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (SuSe 2021).


  • Cutural Studies: Between Political Intervention and Academic Research. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (WS 2020/21).


  • Pop | Culture | Academia. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (SuSe 2020).


  • »hölle die sind die das anderen.« On Exclusions from the Social Order. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Tobias Zintel. (WS 2019/20).


  • Street(s) / Straße(n). Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (WS 2019/20).


  • Working and Writing in Science/Research/Academia. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (SuSe 2019).


  • Urbane Interventionen: spray, bike, build, destroy and develop. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (WS 2018/19).


  • Wissenschaftliches Arbeiten und Schreiben. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (WS 2018/19).


  • »Was sind das für Leute? Was wollen die?« – Pop und/in Theorie. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (SuSe 2018).


  • Spacing: Kolloquium der Fächergruppe Kunst- und Medienwissenschaften. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Prof. Dr. Peter Bexte, Dr. Lilian Haberer, Karin Michalski und Mi You (WS 2017/18).


  • Wissenschaftliches Schreiben. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (WS 2016/17).


  • Drifters, Hobos, Bums und Punks: Huckleberry Finn und andere Amerikanische Outcasts. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. (SuSe 2016).


  • Tiefe Topografien. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. WithThomas Hawranke. (WS 2015/16).


  • Text — Lesen — Diskutieren. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (WS 2015/16).


  • 25 Years and Beyond: West Coast Art of the 1990s. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Prof. Johannes Wohnseifer (SuSe 2015).


  • Arbeitskreis Subkultur (Workshop »Subculture«). Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Prof. Dr. Hans Ulrich Reck. (SuSe 2015).


  • California (Dreamin'). About the »Myth of California«. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Dieuwke Boersma. (WS 2014/15).


  • Skateboarding: Art, Culture, Body, and Discourse. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne. With Prof. Johannes Wohnseifer (SuSe 2014).


  • Suburbia: Film, Kunst, Literatur, Musik. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (WS 2013/14).


  • Subkultur: Theorie und Empirie. Seminar at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (SuSe 2013).


  • "Locals Only": Youth Culture in Southern California. Seminar at the English Department of the University of Cologne (WS 2009/10).


  • Analyzing the Popular: Critical Approaches to American Youth Cultures. Seminar at the English Department of the University of Bremen (SuSe 2008). 


  • Teaching Assistant for the German Department at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania (09/2004-05/2005).


Conferences | Curating


  • POP SUB HOCH GEGEN (II): »Erzählen«. Conference at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, April 28th/29th 2016 (with Prof. Dr. Hans Ulrich Reck and Dr. Jan-Frederik Bandel).


  • POP SUB HOCH GEGEN (I): Symposium zu Theorie und Praxis von Subkultur(en). Conference at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne, June 11th/12th 2015 (with Prof. Dr. Hans Ulrich Reck and Dr. Jan-Frederik Bandel).


  • »Subkultur« – public lectures and films. With Prof. Dr. Hans Ulrich Reck. Ongoing since October 2012.


  • Re/Visions of American Studies. Graduate Conference at the University of Bremen, July 2009 (with Katharina Gerund and Carsten Junker).

Lectures - Seminars

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