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Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics

 

Dr Melina Mandelbaum

picture of dr Mandelbaum
Position(s): 
Schröder Research Associate
Affiliated Lecturer
Department/Section: 
German
Faculty of Modern & Medieval Languages & Linguistics
Contact details: 
College: 
Location: 

Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics Raised Faculty Building University of Cambridge Sidgwick Avenue Cambridge CB3 9DA United Kingdom

About: 

Dr Melina Mandelbaum is a literary and cultural scholar whose interdisciplinary research bridges political theory, literary studies, and cultural analysis. With a foundational background in international politics, her work examines how conceptions of citizenship, belonging, and political agency are represented and contested across literary texts, political theory, and policy discourses – both in historical contexts and in relation to imagined futures.

Melina holds the position of Schröder Research Associate and Affiliated Lecturer in the German section of the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics at the University of Cambridge, and is also a College Research Associate at King’s College, Cambridge. Her current research encompasses two major strands: the first investigates historical imaginaries of citizenship in twentieth-century German literature; the second examines contemporary future oriented visions of citizenship as they emerge in literary fiction, cultural artifacts, and policy documents in Germany and internationally.

Her research is aligned with the international EU Horizon/UKRI project The Cartography of the Political Novel in Europe, which explores the political novel as a medium for protest, participation, and political imagination. She is also the lead convenor of the interdisciplinary research seminar Cultural Production and Social Justice, which brings together scholars across faculties to examine how the arts and humanities can inform more ethical and sustainable futures.

Before taking up her current role, Melina held an AHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship at Cambridge. She also completed her PhD in Cambridge, supported by scholarships from the AHRC, King’s College, and an honorary Vice-Chancellor’s Award. Her earlier academic training spans international relations, comparative politics, and European literature and culture, with degrees from Goldsmiths (BA in International Studies), the London School of Economics and Political Science (MSc in Comparative Politics), and the University of Cambridge (MPhil in European Literature and Culture).

Teaching interests: 

Dr Mandelbaum is currently contributing to the following undergraduate papers:

  • Modern German Culture: 1890 to the Present
  • Aspects of German-Speaking Europe Since 1945
  • Futures in Contemporary German Culture (GE13; co-developed with Dr Maria Roca Lizarazu)
  • Literary Translation
Research interests: 
  • Citizenship and statelessness
  • Twentieth- and twenty-first-century political fiction
  • Utopian and futurist thought
  • German literary and cultural history
  • Cultural narratives and political imagination
  • Narratives of progress and innovation
Published works: 

Colvin, S. and M. Mandelbaum, eds, Routledge Handbook of German Politics and Culture, second edition, Routledge, 2027 (forthcoming).

Mandelbaum, M., ‘“We Must be Open to New Technologies”: A Close Reading of Germany’s Future Strategy for Research and Innovation’, German Politics and Society, summer 2025 (forthcoming)

Mandelbaum, M., ‘“To the Future Turned, We Stand”: Progress and the Temporal Politics of Citizenship in the German Democratic Republic’, Oxford German Studies, Feb 2024

Mandelbaum, M., ‘Administering Exclusion: Statelessness, Identity Papers, and Narrative Strategy in B. Traven’s The Death Ship’ (1926)’, Forum for Modern Language Studies, April 2021 (awarded the Forum Prize for best essay of the year).

In progress:

Mandelbaum, M.: Reading Citizens: Narratives of Citizenship in the Twentieth-Century German Novel (runner-up, Women in German Studies book Prize)

Mandelbaum, M.: ‘Technology and the Modernist Crisis of Perception’ (article)