Simon Rienäcker is a research assistant at the Department of English and American Studies of the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. He received his M.A. in North American Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin in 2016 with a thesis on “The Complexities of Mourning: Susan Howe’s That This and the Notion of Trace.” His interests include mass culture, early African American cinema, body studies, representations of dance, critical race and gender studies. Simon is currently working on his dissertation project “Mobilizing Bodies: Swing Dance and 1930s Mass Culture” (working title).