Year Admitted: 2020
Bio
I studied at the University of Southern Denmark (BA) and at Heidelberg University in Germany (MA) before embarking on my graduate career in Madison. In my dissertation project, “Nasty Emotions,” I theorize the category of “the nasty” as an affective and aesthetic framework for analyzing feelings that can be mobilized toward anti-democratic ends. The emotions I examine (grief, loneliness, care, and fear) are not ontologically nasty, but taken together, they represent, I suggest, an affective domain that is the target of politics. Drawing on a contemporary archive of literary realism, my project explores the critical insights fiction can yield about the nastiness of these feelings.
Research Interests
My research interests span affect theory, political and aesthetic philosophy, as well as twentieth- and twenty-first-century fiction. I am also curious about the affordances of archival research in literary scholarship.
Degree(s) and Institution:
- BA, University of Southern Denmark
- MA, University of Heidelberg
- MA, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Selected Publications
“Nasty Politics,” B20: Boundary2 Online: https://www.boundary2.org/2025/09/johs-rasmussen-nasty-politics/
“Ralph Ellison Travels to Denmark: Invisible Man/Usynlig Mand and the World Location of American Literature” in American Studies in Scandinavia, Vol. 55:2 (Fall 2023)