Johanna Chovanec studied Comparative Literature at the University of Vienna and at Istanbul Bilgi University. She currently is a post-doctoral researcher and lecturer (university assistant) at the Department of Comparative Literature as well as a lecturer at the Department of Near Eastern Studies.  Her current research interests include modern Turkish literature, post-imperial studies, health humanities and neurodiversity studies.

Johanna was previously a doctoral fellow of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW, 2018-2022) and the German Academic Scholarship Foundation (Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes, 2018-2021). Her dissertation ("Turkey's Occidentalist Condition: Images of Self and Other in Early Republican Literature") engaged with East/West dynamics in the Turkish post-imperial novel and was awarded with the Fritz and Helga Exner dissertation award of the Southeast Europe Association. During her PhD, she also was a junior fellow at the IWM, Vienna and an affiliated guest researcher at the Universities of Amsterdam and Oslo. Prior to her PhD, she worked as a researcher for the EU Horizon 2020 project “FEUTURE - The future of EU-Turkey relations” at Sabancı University, Istanbul (2016-2017). As part of the work package “Culture and Identity Drivers”, she studied historical representations of Turkey in Germany, Great Britain and France. Between 2016 and 2020, Johanna was further an affiliated researcher for the interdisciplinary projects “(Post)imperial Narratives in the (Central) European Literatures of Modernity” (Croatian Science Foundation) as well as “Construction of the Other from the Central European Perspective” (OEAD).

Turkish literature, post-imperial and post-colonial studies, identity constructions in Europe and Turkey, health humanities, neurodiversity studies, critical autism studies

• UNIVIE Teaching Award (2024)
  • PS "Neurodiversity in Literature"
• Dissertation Award of the Southeast Europe Association (2024)
  
  • „Turkey’s Occidentalist Condition: Images of Self and Other in Early Republican Literature“
• Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW), 2018-2022 
  •  Doctoral Scholarship                     
• German Academic Scholarship Foundation (Studienstiftung) 2018-2021 
  •  Doctoral Scholarship   
• Austrian Federal Ministry of Science and Research 2018-2019 
  •  Advancement Scholarship for Research Stays Abroad
• German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) 2018 
  • Research Grant (rejected due to prohibition of duplicate financing)
• University of Vienna 2017
  • Merit-based award (Leistungsstipendium) 
• Municipality of Vienna 2015-2016
  • Grant for Scientific Work
• Austrian Academic Exchange Service (OAED) 2015-2016
  • Erasmus+ Scholarship
• Austrian Academic Exchange Service (OAED) 2013-2014
  • Erasmus Scholarship 

Winter term 2034/24, Department of Comparative Literature, University of Vienna

• PS (bachelor seminar): "Neurodiversität in der Literatur: das Autismus-Spektrum erzählen"

Summer term 2023, Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Vienna

• VO (lecture): "Aspekte the modernen türkischen Literatur"
• SE (Master seminar): "Moderne türkische Literatur"

Summer term 2022, Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Vienna

• VO (lecture): "Aspekte der modernen türkischen Literatur"

Summer term 2021, Department of Comparative Literature, University of Vienna

• PS (bachelor seminar) „The Empire Strikes Back“: Post-imperiale Melancholie am Beispiel der türkischen Literatur

Summer term 2021, TürkeiEuropaZentrum (TEZ), University of Hamburg

• VO (lecture) „Die Verortung Istanbuls im post-imperialen Roman“ (21.4.2021), within the lecture series „Stadtgeschichten. Urbane Zentren der Türkei im Wandel der Zeit“

Winter term 2019, Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Vienna

• VO (lecture) „Das Imperium schlägt zurück: Verhandlungen zwischen osmanischer Vergangenheit und nationaler Gegenwart in der türkischen Literatur“ (9.10.2019), within the lecture series „Türkeibezogene Forschung in Österreich“

Summer term 2017, Summer School in Labin, Croatia

• VO (lecture), „Postimperiale Lektüren: Der Osmanische und Habsburgische Mythos“ (23.9.2017), at the summer school „Verflechtungen und Interferenzen im zentraleuropäischen Raum. Kroatisch-Österreichische Sommerschule“ [Interrelations and interferences in Central Europe. Croatian-Austrian summer school], 20.9.-24.9.2017 in Labin, Croatia. https://homepage.univie.ac.at/anna.babka/verflechtungen-und-interferenzen-im-zentraleuropaeischen-raum-kroatisch-oesterreichische-sommerschule-sept-2017/

• Chovanec, J.; Heilo, Olof; Raudvere, Catharina (organisers): conference „Viribus Unitis. Myths and Narratives of Habsburg and Ottoman Multinationalism 1848-1918“, University Copenhagen, 1.-4. November 2018.

• Chovanec, J. (organiser): panel „Krisen, Umbrüche und Widerstände in Kultur und Gesellschaft“ [crisis, change and resistance in culture and society], conference „3rd European Convention on Turkic, Ottoman & Turkish Studies“, University of Bamberg/Germany, 19.-21. September 2018.

• Aydın-Düzgit, Senem; Chovanec, J.; Königsbrun, Romana; Rumelili, Bahar (organisers): conference „Cultural Relations between Turkey and Europe“ in cooperation with the Austrian Cultural Forum Istanbul and Koc University, Istanbul, 14.-15. September 2018.

• Chovanec, J. (organiser): panel „Kultur und Gesellschaft“ at the workshop „Türkeiforschung im deutschsprachigen Raum V-2018: Umbrüche – Krisen – Widerstände“ [young perspectives in the field of Turkey studies in the German-speaking region. Volume IV. Change – Crisis – Resistance], University of Hamburg, Asia-Africa-Institute, 16.-17. March 2018. https://www.aai.uni-hamburg.de/tuerkeieuropa/veranstaltungen/ workshops/tuerkeiforschung2018.html

• Chovanec, J. (organiser): panel „(Post-) Imperial Narratives in the (Central) European Literatures of Modernity“ at the 21st world congress of the International Comparative Literature Association, University of Vienna, 23.7.2016. https://icla2016.univie.ac.at/de/ gruppenveranstaltungen/

University of Zagreb (Croatia)

• affiliated researcher of the project “Construction of the Other from the Central European Perspective”, funded by the “Austria/Croatia: Scientific & Technological Cooperation” (OEAD), (2018-2020)

• affiliated researcher of the project “(Post-)imperiale Narrative in den zentraleuropäischen Literaturen der Moderne”, funded by the Croatian Science Foundation (2016-2018)

Sabanci University, Istanbul (Turkey)

• Scientific Employee for the EU Horizon 2020 - project „The future of EU-Turkey Relations: Mapping dynamics and testing scenarios - FEUTURE“, Work Package 7 „Identity and Cultural Relations“, http://www.feuture.eu/ (2016-2017)