


For a number of years now, the spectre of 鈥渃ancel culture鈥 has been conjured up in the media and at universities: bans on thinking and speaking supposedly hold sway. Those accused of being 鈥渃ancellers鈥 are primarily young, left-leaning, from a minority group and female 鈥 in brief: 鈥渨oke鈥 鈥 individuals.
However, from the perspective of censorship research, the complaint of a new age of censorship is nothing new: this narrative is a continuation of the debate surrounding 鈥減olitical correctness鈥 from the 1990s, under different media-related conditions. It can be explained as a defensive behaviour on the part of social elites, who have come under pressure in an age where a diversity of voices are expressed via social media. That their complaint of supposedly no longer being allowed to say anything is indeed expressed very loudly shows that the issue here is less about not being able to speak and more about a privileged unwillingness to listen in a diverse society.
Free speech and cancel culture
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More on the topics of censorship research, political correctness and cancel culture and on the work area focused on modern German literature and comparative literature:
- Discussion with Prof. Dr. Matthias Lorenz and the censorship researcher Prof. Dr. Nikola Ro脽bach on (in German)
- Introductory volume by Matthias Lorenz, , on the topic of 鈥減olitical correctness鈥 among other subjects (Open Access publication)
- Information about the represented by Prof. Dr. Matthias Lorenz (in German)
Participating researcher
In the German Department, , professor of modern German literature and comparative literature, studies the social and political interrelationships of literature from the nineteenth to twenty-first centuries. His research focuses include, among other things, censorship and anti-Semitism research.



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