Postdoctoral Researcher

The position is limited to three years. The anticipated starting date is 01 October .

The position is part of the project LitAttention – What Short Fiction Knows About Attention and Attention Politics, funded by the European Research Council (ERC). LitAttention combines approaches from cognitive literary studies, computational linguistics/digital humanities, and educational psychology to investigate ‘literary attention’. The project will (a) examine the connection between developments in short fiction and changing theories of attention; (b) explore literary techniques and linguistic devices that guide readers’ attention; (c) develop methodological and conceptual frameworks for examining literary attention; and (d) assess the value of short fiction today, especially for education. LitAttention is based at the Department of English Literatures and Cultures and integrated into a strong interdisciplinary community, including the Stuttgart Research Centre for Text Studies (SRCTS), the Institute for Natural Language Processing (IMS), and the Center for Reflected Text Analytics (CRETA).

What we offer
- The opportunity to join a highly motivated, dynamic, and supportive team
- An international, stimulating work environment, strongly committed to interdisciplinary research
- Flexible working hours in a family-friendly environment
- A fixed-term contract (limited to three years) in salary group TV-L 13 (the pay scale grouping will be determined by the university’s central administration)
- Mentoring that emphasises professional and scientific growth
- Internal training and coaching opportunities
- Numerous additional benefits offered by the University of Stuttgart ( email your application to by 10 June . In your application, please include the reference number LitAttention_CLS.

Please include the following documents (as one single PDF file): motivation letter including a short description of your past and current research interests as well as your expertise in the required area; academic CV; a publication list; copies of academic certificates and transcript of records, an abstract of your PhD thesis (or equivalent) (3 pages max.), and the names and contact details of two academic referees. Please also submit a PDF document of your PhD thesis (or equivalent). If you have not yet completed your PhD thesis (or equivalent), please submit finalised chapters/papers and a letter of recommendation from your supervisor, which includes the expected date of completion of your degree.

If you have any questions about the position, please contact Prof Dr Sibylle Baumbach, stuttgart.de.

The University of Stuttgart is a certified ‘family-friendly university’ and offers a wide range of services to support early-career researchers ( and to enhance social equity ( University of Stuttgart is an equal opportunity employer ( Women who apply will be given preferential consideration in areas in which they are underrepresented. Applications from severely disabled candidates with equivalent qualifications will be given priority.

Your tasks
The successful candidate will explore the value of literary attention in short fiction for education by investigating how short narratives were, are, and might be used in (historical) educational settings to train attention management skills. They will further be responsible for designing and conducting empirical studies, including eye-tracking studies, on attention and attention patterns in short fiction.
As part of the LitAttention team, they will be involved in the organisation of project events, public outreach activities, presentations at international conferences, and project publications.

Required qualifications
- PhD in (Educational) Psychology, Psycholinguistics, Cognitive Science, or an adjacent field, and willingness to engage in interdisciplinary research
- Experience in running and evaluating eye-tracking experiments of reading behaviour
- Advanced programming skills in Python and R
- Excellent methodological and analytical skills, with experience in analysing complex data
- Excellent language skills (written and spoken) in English; proficiency in German is welcome but not required
- Proven organisational and administrative skills
- Familiarity with narrative theory and/or literary studies is a plus