Francesco Fritz joined the PhD program in German Studies with a DE in critical theory in the Fall of 2025. His research interests stretch across the rhetorics of health and medicine, computational literature, translation studies, and critical theory. His work draws on his literary studies, his clinical work as a medical doctor for the Berlin AIDS Foundation, and epidemiologic fieldwork in Latin America, where he investigated the provision of psychiatric care and the mental health of incarcerated populations. At Berkeley, he’s working to connect cross-linguistic narratives of illness with new media forms, examining how changing forms of textual production are reshaping cultural artifacts and medical frameworks.
Francesco studied Comparative Literature and Philosophy at Columbia University and the Free University of Berlin, from which he obtained his BA. He also holds a medical degree following his clinical studies at Charité Medical School in Berlin and the Universidad Complutense de Madrid. He later obtained a research doctorate from Charité for his work on suicide risk among incarcerated individuals in South America.
