Heide Crawford

Research and teaching interests include the origins of the vampire in German literature, the development of German Gothic horror literature since the 18th century and its connection with central European cultural history, the occult in literature, the German folklore and fairy tale tradition, trends in European and American Gothic horror literature and film, the relationship between science and literature (especially Gothic Horror literature), and the impact of aesthetic theory and German Idealism on German Gothic horror narrative strategy. Additional teaching interests include German cultural history, business German, current events, and environmentalism in German literature and in contemporary culture. She has published articles and book chapters on the vampire in German literature, teaching the vampire, aesthetics of horror in E.T.A. Hoffmann's works, visualization in Goethe's poem "Die Metamorphose der Pflanzen," the Gothic gaze in the TV series, Fear the Walking Dead, and regionalism in Ernst Moritz Arndt's fairy tales. She is the recipient of two awards for teaching excellence for undergraduate and graduate teaching from the University of Kansas and she created and directs UGA’s Freiburg Study Abroad program. Dr. Crawford's book The Origins of the Literary Vampire was published in September 2016. Current projects include a translation and critical edition of the first known vampire novel Der Vampyr, oder die Todtenbraut (1826) by Theodor Hildebrandt.