Christina von Braun, Prof. Dr. phil., Cultural Theorist, Author, and Filmmaker
Born in Rome in 1944. Studied in the United States and Germany. From 1969 to 1981 she lived in Paris, working as an independent author and filmmaker.
During this period, she produced films on André Malraux, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Marguerite Yourcenar and the Académie Française, Meret Oppenheim, and Flaubert’s Madame Bovary,
as well as historical documentaries on Algerian literature, the women of the French Revolution, and a film series on the history of death in Western civilization (Zum Sterben muss man geboren sein, 1978).
Around this time, she also began work on a book about the history of so-called “female diseases” such as hysteria and anorexia. The book was published in 1985 under the
title Nicht ich. Logik, Lüge, Libido and has since gone through nine editions (most recently in 2009).
In 1981 she moved to Germany, where her work focused primarily on historical films, including A History of Utopian Thought, a portrait of German pacifism in the Imperial and Weimar periods, a series on the history of denazification in East and West Germany, and a trilogy on the history of anti-Judaism and antisemitism in the German-speaking world (Der Ewige Judenhass, 1990). Further films include Die Angst der Satten (1991) on the hunger strike as a political weapon, Böses Blut (1994) on the mythologies surrounding syphilis, and Vom Sinn des Sehens. Augen-Blicke der Geschlechter (1994) on the impact of visual technologies on the symbolic order of gender.
Parallel to her filmmaking, she began her academic career. From 1991 to 1993 she was a Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities (Kulturwissenschaftliches Institut) in Essen. During this period she completed her Ph.D. (1990) and her Habilitation (1992). In 1994 she was appointed to a C4 Professorship in Cultural Studies at Humboldt University of Berlin. From 1997 to 2002 she founded and directed the Gender Studies Program at Humboldt University of Berlin. Between 2005 and 2012 she served as Speaker of the DFG-funded Graduate Research Training Group Gender as a Category of Knowledge. She was also co-applicant and principal investigator in several other research projects, including the DAAD-funded Walter Benjamin Guest Professorship for German-Jewish Cultural History (2005–2014), the Leo Baeck Summer University for Jewish Studies (2003), and the College for Jewish Studies (2009). From 2012 to 2014 she served as Founding Director of the Center for Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg (now Selma Stern Center for Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg). From 2012 to 2024 she was a member of the Board of Directors and has since been a Senior Research Fellow at the Center.
Her body of work comprises approximately fifty documentary and essay films on cultural and historical subjects (see Filmography), twenty books, and numerous essays (see Bibliography). Much of her work addresses questions of gender, the history of religion (particularly the relationship between Christianity and Judaism), and the interrelation between media and the history of mentalities — including explorations of writing, money, and the body.
In its review of Der Preis des Geldes (Berlin, 2012), the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung wrote that the author “interweaves narratives from psychoanalysis, philosophy, and sociology with insights from economics, cultural, and historical studies to create an illuminating intellectual panorama.” This interdisciplinary approach characterizes much of her oeuvre.
In 2013 Christina von Braun received the Sigmund Freud Cultural Award, presented by the German Psychoanalytical Association to non-analysts who apply psychoanalytic theory to cultural phenomena. In 2014 she was awarded the Hedwig Dohm Medal by the German Association of Women Journalists (Deutscher Journalistinnenbund). In 2018 she was named Chevalier des Arts et Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture, and in 2025 she received the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesverdienstkreuz).
Impressum - letzte Aktualisierung: 26.10.2025