Literary Attention in Short Fiction, or: What Literature Knows About Attention and Attention Politics

The project is funded by an ERC Advanced Grant (LitAttention, 101141722)

Project Summary

Literature knows a lot about attention – how it is gained and retained, how it is mastered and manipulated. As such it can contribute significantly to current research in interdisciplinary attention studies and offer insight into attention regimes we live by. LitAttention explores this fundamentally under-researched knowledge domain of literature about attention and attention politics by analysing ‘literary attention’ in short fiction.

Integrating approaches from (educational) psychology, computational linguistics, and literary and cultural studies, LitAttention explores the poetics and politics of attention in short fiction, develops methodological and conceptual frameworks for examining literary attention, and introduces the important role of literary attention for education.

The project is structured into several subprojects. Current subprojects examine attention in 19th-century short fiction (SP 1), the short story as attention narrative (SP 2), literary attention in educational short fiction (SP 3), and develop computational models for analysing literary attention (SP 4). Two further subprojects are due to start in 2025/2026.

Team



Dieses Bild zeigt Sibylle Baumbach

 

Prof. Dr. Sibylle Baumbach (Project leader)

Sibylle Baumbach is professor of English literatures and cultures. LitAttention builds on her previous research on literature, attention, and fascination as well as on her expertise in literary theory and interdisciplinary approaches to literature. She is Principal Investigator of LitAttention and focuses on developments of the short story as attention narrative (SP 2).




Dieses Bild zeigt Hannah Armour
Hannah Armour (Doctoral Researcher)
 
Hannah Armour is a PhD student with a Masters from the University of Oxford and a BA from Royal Holloway, University of London. Her PhD thesis, looking at the relationship between the role of attention and the rise of short fiction between 1800 and 1880, will form part of the LitAttention project (SP 1). Her research examines the methods by which short fiction forms cater themselves to changing attention economies and environments, especially regarding the emergence of genres such as those that centralise discussions of the educational, psychological, detective and gothic.
 


Dieses Bild zeigt Christy Gu
Dr. Christy J. Gu (Postdoctoral research fellow)

Christy J. Gu focuses on identifying stylistic devices in short fiction that are related to attention manipulation and using empirical methods to examine their potential effects. Additionally, she explores how and to what extent these identified patterns may influence attention from the perspective of educational psychology.

 

 

 Jan Angermeier (Doctoral Researcher)

Jan Angermeier is a PhD student at the University of Stuttgart, with a Master of Arts in Digital Humanities and a Bachelor of Arts in English and Political Science. His PhD thesis, focusing on computational modelling of attention-related literary phenomena in short fiction, constitutes part of the LitAttention project (SP 6). His research examines how short fiction adapts to changing attention economies and environments, particularly through the use of syntactic, semantic, and narrative strategies that elicit attention. Jan Angermeier's work involves developing methodological frameworks and utilising machine learning models to analyse literary attention devices, contributing to the interdisciplinary field of attention studies.

This image shows Aurora Angione

 Aurora Angione (Student Research Assistant)

Max Schmid (Student Research Assistant)

 

News

06.11.2025

Guest Lecture by Catherine Emmott
Dr. Catherine Emmott (University of Glasgow) will join us for the LitAttention Colloquium on November 06, 11:30-13:00 (K2, room 17.24) with a talk on “Attention Control in Detective Fiction: Rhetorical Manipulation, Cognitive Misdirection, and Plot Construction”. All welcome!
October 2025

New Team Members
Aurora Angione and Max Schmid joined the LitAttention team in October as student research assistants. A very warm welcome to both of them!
08.08.2025

First LitAttention Project Publication
August 2024

Join the LitAttention team
Seeking two research assistants to join the LitAttention team
13.04.2024 What short stories know about attention
European Research Council awards Sibylle Baumbach an  Advanced Grant

 

Events

November 2025 — January 2026
Join us to discuss current approaches in the field of literary attention — together with our guest speakers Catherine Emmott (Glasgow), Carolin Duttlinger (Oxford) and Alice Bennett (Bergen) (see flyer for details). All welcome! Mark your calendars and come along! 
18.06.2025
Workshop: Using Eye Tracking to Explore Attention and Distraction in Literary Texts (18 July 2025)
In this workshop, we explore and discuss current approaches, risks, and challenges with Jana Lüdkte (FU Berlin), Marloes Mak (Tilburg University), and Patrick Sturt (Edinburgh University).


Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Research Council Executive Agency. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

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