Sit venia verbo: A case for dermacriticism

AbstractThis article introduces the term “skinnedness” as a complementary notion to what we commonly refer to as skin. The term allows for a fundamental conceptual discussion that brings together human skin, animal skin, and other types of organic or artificial skin, such as fruit skin or the soft outer layer of a doll. The dermacritical approach developed here explores the unique affordances of skin and skin‐like phenomena, including their “graphordance,” that is, the implicit invitation to write on them. Through a thorough discussion of works by Oskar Kokoschka, Hermine Moos, Lester Gaba, and Herta Müller, this paper offers a philosophically and historically informed perspective on the skinnedness of skin, integrating its symptomatic, semantic, and aesthetic dimensions from a comparative literary perspective.