Eric Jarosinski (born 1971) is an American

Germanist German studies is the field of humanities that researches, documents and disseminates German language and literature in both its historic and present forms. Academic departments of German studies often include classes on German culture, German hi ...

, author, humorist, and public speaker. Jarosinski writes under the

nom de plume A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...

NeinQuarterly on the

social network A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...

ing site

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

, where he writes linguistic, political, and philosophical aphorisms, keeping to the 140-character limit. Jarosinski writes in

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

, Dutch and

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

. He began tweeting in 2012 and soon had a significant following (with 150,000 followers as of 2017). He then made the jump to print with a weekly column in the leading German weekly ''

Die Zeit ''Die Zeit'' (, "The Time") is a German national weekly newspaper published in Hamburg in Germany. The newspaper is generally considered to be among the German newspapers of record and is known for its long and extensive articles. History The ...

'' (2014–present) and the Dutch daily ''

NRC Handelsblad ''NRC'', previously called ''NRC Handelsblad'' (), is a daily morning newspaper published in the Netherlands by NRC Media. It is generally accepted as a newspaper of record in the Netherlands. History ''NRC Handelsblad'' was first published on 1 ...

'' (2015-2016) Jarosinski's first book
Nein. A Manifesto
' was released in 2015 and has been published in English, German, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, and Danish.

Background

Eric Jarosinski German Embassy Washington DC 8 October 2015

Jarosinski grew up in Park Falls,

Wisconsin Wisconsin () is a state in the upper Midwestern United States. Wisconsin is the 25th-largest state by total area and the 20th-most populous. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake M ...

. As a child he had some exposure to the German language (Wisconsin having a large number of

German American German Americans (german: Deutschamerikaner, ) are Americans who have full or partial German ancestry. With an estimated size of approximately 43 million in 2019, German Americans are the largest of the self-reported ancestry groups by the Unite ...

s), though he ascribes his interest in German culture and language more to his travels in Europe and later study of German and Journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. During those years he studied abroad in Bonn and at the University of Utrecht in the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

, where he learned Dutch, and went on to spend a year studying in Frankfurt am Main as a Fulbright scholar. After study and dissertation research in Berlin as a German Chancellor Fellow (Alexander von Humboldt Foundation), Jarosinski completed his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 2005 with a dissertation on "transparency" as a political aesthetic and highly fraught ideological program. Jarosinski has taught at the University of Rochester (2004-2005), Rutgers University (2005-2007), and the University of Pennsylvania (2007-2014), where his research and teaching focused on the Frankfurt School theorists Theodor Adorno,

Walter Benjamin Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (; ; 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940) was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic and essayist. An eclectic thinker, combining elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, and Jewish mys ...

and Siegfried Kracauer as well the work of Marx, Nietzsche and Kafka. He now teaches the German language at Fordham University (2022-2024).

References

Sources

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External links

Who is the Man Behind Nein Quarterly?
A Conversation with

Paul Holdengräber Paul Bernard Holdengräber (born March 15, 1960) is an American interviewer, curator and writer. He was director of the New York Public Library's public programming and organized literary conversations for the NYPL's public program series, ''LIVE ...

in
LitHub
'' March 23, 2016 {{DEFAULTSORT:Jarosinski, Eric 1971 births Living people People from Park Falls, Wisconsin University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni Germanists