A recently-published children’s book shows family conversations about sex to be difficult, but also funny at times. Other recent publications feature robots at school, environmental protection, Death Junior and German grammar.

Sven Regener‘s new novel is a bit like the prequels and sequels to the Star Wars saga – and a bit like James Joyce’s Ulysses. While it lacks a cogent plot, it doesn’t really need one.
 

Animals appear in unexpected places in recent picture books. They also convey the realisation that humans are strange creatures.

Visitors to museums and archives usually interact with exhibits locked in display cases in darkened rooms. Yet modern technology has given us ways to more directly experience art and cultural artefacts. Coding da Vinci is an open, cultural data hackathon that digitally brings museum pieces to life.  

University teaching has become increasingly specialised over the centuries. But the topics addressed in research today increasingly require an interdisciplinary approach.  Leibniz Association president Matthias Kleiner sees a renaissance of universal research. 

Carbon offset schemes promise to compensate for the emissions caused by private individuals – as air travellers, for instance – with donations to climate projects. But are they not just a way of salving guilty consciences?  

Over the past 120 years, Marxist ideas have undergone frequent revivals on the silver screen.

German television shows tend to have a bad reputation for poor writing and cheap productions not suited for an international market and audience. Now series like “Deutschland ‘83” and “Babylon Berlin” are putting a new shine on that tarnished image. 

Who are they and how do they live? The advertising and media world has discovered a new target group: Generation Z, fully digitalized since birth, is coming of age. But on screen they are (still) representing the lives of Millennials.

2020 was a year of great upheavals, a turning point. The pop and electronic music sectors had to grapple with the basic question of how to make a living amid a pandemic, ensuing crisis and concrete policy decisions.

As in many other areas of society, the coronavirus pandemic took a heavy toll on German musical life in 2020. Patrick Hahn recalls what did happen last year all the same in the classical, contemporary and early music scenes.

What happens when musicians and their audience have to keep their distance? Jazz festivals came up with various strategies to cope with that situation in the year of the coronavirus crisis. But even more auspicious are some ideas musicians themselves have come up with – for their own sake and for the future of improvised music. They deserve a hearing because their livelihoods really are at stake now.