Keynote speakers

Molly Andrews

Professor of Sociology. Co-director of the Centre for Narrative Research School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of East London, England.

Selected publications: “Beyond narrative: The shape of traumatic testimony” (2010); “The narrative complexity of successful aging” (2009); “Against good advice: Reflections on conducting research in a country where you don’t speak the language” (2009); “Never the last word: Narrative research and secondary analysis” (2008); Shaping history: Narratives of political change (2008); Lifetimes of commitment: Aging, politics, psychology (1991/ re-issued 2008).

Cathy Caruth
Frank H. T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters English and Comparative Literature, Cornell University, USA

Selected publications: Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative and History (1996); Editor, with introductions Trauma: Explorations in Memory (1995) (1996); Co-editor, Critical Encounters: Reference and Responsibility in Deconstructive Writing (1995); Special Editor, Psychoanalysis, Culture and Trauma (Two Issues of American Imago: A Journal for Psychoanalysis, Culture and the Arts (1991); Empirical Truths and Critical Fictions: Locke, Wordsworth, Kant, Freud (1990).

Current projects: Literature in the Ashes of History (book). Pathbreaking Memories: Conversations with Leaders in the Theory and Treatment of Trauma (book of interviews and photographic portraits).

Trond Heir

Senior Researcher at the Norwegian Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies, University of Oslo.

Selected publications: “Visiting the site of death: experiences of the bereaved after the 2004 Southeast Asia tsunami” (co-author, in press); “Use of and satisfaction with support received among survivors from three Scandinavian countries after the 2004 Southeast Asian tsunami (co-author, in press); “Tsunami-affected Scandinavian tourists: Disaster exposure and post traumatic stress symptoms (2011, co-author); “Psychiatric disorders and functional impairment among disaster victims after exposure to a natural disaster – a population based study (co-author, 2011). “Association of violence against partner and former victim experiences: A sample of clients voluntarily attending therapy” (co-author, 2010). “Posttraumatic stress symptom clusters associations with psychopathology and functional impairment” (co-author, 2010). “Changes in religious beliefs and the relation of religiosity to posttraumatic stress and life satisfaction after a natural disaster” (co-author, 2010).

Jakob Lothe

Professor of British-American Literature, University of Oslo, Norway

Research interests include English literature (especially modernism) Conrad, Joyce, Woolf, Kafka, Faulkner), narrative theory and analysis, literature and film, postcolonial studies, travel literature, and studies of the Holocaust.

Selected publications: Less Is More: Short Fiction Theory and Analysis (co-editor and contributor, 2008); Comparative Approaches to European and Nordic Modernisms(co-editor and contributor, 2008); Franz Kafka. Theory, Rhetoric, and Reading (co-editor and contributor, 2008); Literary Landscapes: From Modernism to Postcolonialism (co-editor and contributor, 2008); Joseph Conrad: Voice, Sequence, History, Genre (co-editor and contributor, 2008); Comparative Approaches to European and Nordic Modernism (co-editor, 2008); Tidsvitner. Fortellinger fra Auschwitz og Sachsenhausen (Time's Witnesses: Narratives from Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen (co-editor and contributor, 2006); The Art of Brevity (co-editor and contributor, 2004).

Steve Sem-Sandberg

Steve Sem-Sandberg (b. 1958) is a literary critic and prizewinning novelist. His latest novel De fattiga i Łodź (2009, Eng. trans. The Emperor of Lies, 2011) won the August Prize, the Swedish equivalent of the Man Booker Prize, and is to be translated into 27 languages. Other works include: Härifrån till Allmänningen (novel, 2005), Ravensbrück (novel, 2003), Prag (no exit) (2002, essays), Allt förgängligt är bara en bild (1999, novel), Theres (1996, novel) and Den kluvna spegeln (1991, reportage). Sem-Sandberg lives in Stockholm and Vienna.

Lars Weisæth

Professor, Senior Researcher at the Norwegian Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies, University of Oslo.

Selected publications: “Disaster survivors in their third decade-trajectories of initial stress responses and long-term course of mental health” (co-author, in press); “Visiting the site of death: Experiences of the bereaved after the 2004 Southeast Asia tsunami.” (co-author, in press); “Tsunami-affected Scandinavian tourists: Disaster exposure and post traumatic stress symptoms (co-author, 2011); “Psychiatric disorders and functional impairment among disaster victims after exposure to a natural disaster – a population based study” (co-author, 2011); “Posttraumatic stress symptom clusters associations with psychopathology and functional impairment” (co-author, 2010); “Initial Stress Responses in Relation to Outcome After Three Decade” (co-author, 2010); “Changes in religious beliefs and the relation of religiosity to posttraumatic stress and life satisfaction after a natural disaster” (co-author, 2010).