N.B. The course schedule will be available in May of 2012. Course descriptions and required texts are subject to change.
NB: 2012 Graduate Courses will be announced in May, 2012
Courses
Courses offered in the past four years.
▲ indicates offered in the current term
▹ indicates offered in the upcoming term[s]
GRMN 6601 - Adv Language Practice ▲
This course will focus on various forms of academic writing, including the specific use of vocabulary, style and grammar. Students will have the opportunity to practice writing summaries of texts, presentations and discussions. Additionally, proper quoting and commenting as well as structuring a text – such as a course or term paper – will be discussed and practised. Finally, students will be given the opportunity to write their own papers, reports and comments.
A reader will be provided.
Language & StylisticsSummer 2008, Summer 2009, Summer 2010, Summer 2011, Summer 2012
GRMN 6610 - Intro Literary Analysis ▲
An Introduction to Literary Analysis (“Schreibprozesse”)
This course combines creative writing in German with literary theory. It is designed to develop aesthetic sensibilities by looking at sample literary texts and the methods they use to create their effects. While literary forms are too multifaceted to be reproduced according to a formula, there are nevertheless some techniques and forms of writing that can be garnered from exemplary literary texts and practiced in one’s own creative writing. What do metaphors, allegories, poems, stories, or dramatic scenes of others ‘feel’ like if they are read or if they are written by oneself? How is day-to-day story telling transformed into ‘literary’ story telling? What makes images into a poem, or a text into a film?
We will work on forms of metaphor and explore theories of metaphor and the creation of metaphors, then turn them into practice by writing examples ourselves. We will explore modern allegories by analyzing poems by H.M. Enzensberger and Sarah Kirsch, the sound and tonal qualities of poems by looking at H. Ball or Ernst Jandl,. We will write examples of both ourselves as a kind of practice. We will also look into the use of paintings as models for literary texts.. We will compare quotidian narration and literary narration by looking at examples by Kafka, Fühmann, and Bachmann. In all these instances, we will write short examples of the poetic forms and narratives that we have studied and discussed. Finally, we will also consider how to move from a novel to the film version of the novel (Döblin’s Berlin Alexanderplatz).
A reader will be made available.
LiteratureSummer 2008, Summer 2009, Summer 2010, Summer 2011, Summer 2012
GRMN 6611 - Mann,Schopenhauer,Nietzsche
Thomas Mann, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche (Seminar)
The course will use Thomas Mann’s two essays, Schopenhauer and Nietzsches Philosophie im Lichte unserer Erfahrung, to explore Mann’s essayistic style and to discuss his understanding and adaptation of the two philosophers and their influence on his fiction. The results of this analysis will then be applied to Thomas Mann’s three Künstlernovellen, Tonio Kröger, Tristan and Der Tod in Venedig, to place the work into a broader cultural context and to achieve a deeper understanding.
Required texts: Thomas Mann, Der Tod in Venedig und andere Erzählungen.60. Aufl. (Fischer). The essays will be included in a reader.
LiteratureSummer 2009
GRMN 6612 - 19 & 20C German History ▲
"Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit": German History of the 19th & 20th century*
This course will focus on developing an understanding of the most siginificant contexts, developments, continuities and discontinuities of German history during the nineteenth and twentieth century. „Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit“ – the beginning of the German national anthem’s third stanza – will be the starting point of the discussion and German history will be analyzed against this background. What did unity, justice and freedom signify during the two centuries under the ever changing rules of government and during a time when modernity changed the lives of most people dramatially and fundamentally? Which hopes, anxieties and infractions were and are assoicated with these terms and their application and interpretation for German life in the areas of state, society, culture and economy? Finally,the course will investigate if the triad „Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit“ is actually a suitable formula to define German history since the 19th century.
Area StudiesSummer 2012
GRMN 6615 - Thomas Mann:The Magic Mountain
Thomas Mann: The Magic Mountain
Thomas Mann’s novel „Der Zauberberg“ is one of the most influential works of 20th century German literature. The story of the young Hamburgian engineer Hans Castorp, who unexpectedly spends seven years in a lung-sanatorium in Davos, high up in the Swiss Alps, presents a panoramic view of pre-war European civilisation. The novel is as well a fascinating ironic narration as a deep philosophical reflection about themes like „time“, „death“, „reason and sexual desire“, „modernity and political radicalism“. The course will be dedicated to an accurate interpretation both of the intellectual contents and the aesthetic form of Mann’s novel. (1 unit)
Required Text Mann, Der Zauberberg (Fischer)
LiteratureSummer 2011
GRMN 6617 - History of Austria in 20th C
Between Tradition and Modernity: The History of Austria in the 20th Century (Seminar)
A survey of the eventful Austrian history in the past 100 years from the Doppelmonarchie Austria-Hungary, the First Republic of Austria in 1918, and the Anschluss to nationalistic Germany in 1938, to the founding of the Second Republic in 1945, the attainment of sovereignty in 1955 and the joining of the European Union in 1995. The emphasis will not be exclusively on political developments but also on social and cultural history. The course will deal with literature, science and the arts as well as with everyday life and questions of cultural and national identity.
Required text: Karl Vocelka, Geschichte Österreichs. Kultur, Gesellschaft, Politik. 3. Aufl. (Heyne).
Area StudiesSummer 2009
GRMN 6619 - Applied Linguistics
Applied Linguistics for the Teaching of German
This course introduces principles and concepts in applied linguistics and a variety of approaches to language pedagogy to enhance the understanding of foreign language teaching, with an emphasis on teaching German. Topics include: second language acquisition, socio-linguistics and pragma-linguistics, phonetics, recent changes in usage in the German language, various assessment tools, and the introduction to The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages as a model for curriculum development.
Required Texts: Jörg Roche, Fremdsprachenerwerb Fremdsprachendidaktik, 2008 2nd Edition (Narr Francke Attempto Verlag, Tübingen), as well as handouts and prepared materials.
Language & StylisticsSummer 2008, Summer 2010
GRMN 6620 - The German Media
The German Media - Guarantor of Democracy? - Die deutsche Medienlandschaft - Garant der Demokratie?
For democracy to survive, independent media are indispensable, a kind of fourth power. Freedom of the press, freedom of opinion and speech – until unification in 1990 both German states, the BRD and the DDR, interpreted and administered freedom in different ways. How much freedom, how much openness does democracy need? And how much influence should government be allowed to exercise, especially in the face of terrorism and violence? The seminar offers a survey of the German press and mass media in recent German history. (1 Unit)
Summer 2008
GRMN 6621 - Reinventing German Identity
Narrating without End or: Do the Germans Re-invent Themselves? (Seminar)
Gone are the days of modernist experiments. Since the fall of the wall in 1989 and the German reunification, (short) story telling had an unexpected renaissance in literature, film and TV. Curricula vitae are produced against the background of historical events. Even young writers and film directors are trying out variations of the classical family saga, biographies are booming and the Heimatfilm is experiencing an unforeseen comeback. To tell stories seems to create identity, it seems to integrate the individual into a larger context establishing general support in times that are getting more complex everyday. Do the Germans re-invent themselves through these narratives? Is only the “small story” important because the larger history has failed? And vice versa: Can the larger history be told again through the many “smaller stories”? (1 unit)
Required text: Judith Hermann, Sommerhaus, später. Erzählungen. (Fischer)
Area StudiesSummer 2009
GRMN 6623 - Beyond Headlines:GRMN Print ▲
Beyond the Headlines: The German Print
This course explores the German print media landscape between yellow press and feuilleton. We will discuss the different types of texts like reportage, commentary or portrait, analyze texts and write our own articles. We will learn how to edit, to text headlines and captions. Twice a week we’ll develop our own magazine in editorial staff meetings. After three weeks, the photographer Christine Sommerfeldt will join us, and together we compose a visual concept for the magazine, which will be designed by Art Director Nadja Zobel in Berlin. At the end of the course we will present the Middlebury College Zeitschrift Nr. 1.
Language & StylisticsSummer 2012
GRMN 6625 - Guilt &Atonement in Lit & Film
Between Guilt, Atonement and Disremembering – /Vergangenheitsbewältigung/ in Literature and Film since 1945 (Seminar)
From Kahlschlagliteratur to the verdict that poetry could not be composed anymore after Auschwitz; from collective guilt and charges against the Vatergeneration to the meticulous research of particular cases, literature and film gave crucial impulses for dealing with the German past. Lately, however, facts are changed into fiction, the downfall of Germany is turned into a movie, and the Third Reich runs as a “docu-soap opera” on TV. Is the time right for such fictionalization? And above all, is German society stable enough for this process? (This course may alternatively be counted to fulfill one Literature requirement.)
Required texts: Jurek Becker, Jakob der Lügner (Suhrkamp); Günter Grass, Im Krebsgang. Eine Novelle (Deutscher Taschebuch Verlag); Uwe Timm, Am Beispiel meines Bruders (Kiepenheuer & Witsch).
Summer 2008
GRMN 6629 - The Other Germans
The other Germans: Postwar society and its unwanted refugees from the East
3-week course, first summer session
The course provides an insight into postwar German history, culture and literature. It focuses on the arrival of millions of German refugees from the East and how radically they changed Germany after 1945. (1 unit)
Required Texts: Kossert, Kalte Heimat. Die Geschichte der der deutschen Vertriebenen nach 1945 (Pantheon); Elliger, Und tief in der Seele das Ferne. Die Geschichte einer Vertreibung aus Schlesien (rororo); Hein, Landnahme. Roman (Suhrkamp).
Area StudiesSummer 2011
GRMN 6633 - Germany After Fall of the Wall
Germany After the Fall of the Wall
A survey and analysis of German society, politics, and cultural life during the last twenty years from 1989 to 2009. We will explore challenges and developments during this process of unification as well as the conditions of West and East Germany (BRD and DDR) in the year of the fall of the wall. The following topic, will be included: changes in everyday life, the development of the political landscape, the green movement, the influence and importance of the European Union, immigrants, the media, literature and film.
Required Texts: Ingo Schulze, Simple Stories. (dtv).
Summer 2010
GRMN 6637 - The "Third Reich"
The “Third Reich” (Seminar)
Analysis of the 12 years of national-socialist dictatorship in Germany from 1933 to 1945 as well as of the events that led to the rise of the Third Reich and the consequences for the time that followed. The following topics will be explored: The conditions that caused the transfer of power to Hitler; the establishment of the dictatorship 1933/34; the economy and society in the Third Reich; everyday life; anti-Semitism; the SS-state: persecution and annihilation - the system of concentration camps; resistance; the unleashing of WW II; German occupation policies; der totale Krieg and the end of the Third Reich; the handling of the national-socialist past after 1945.
Required text: Wolfgang Benz, Geschichte des Dritten Reiches (dtv)
Area StudiesSummer 2009
GRMN 6638 - The Poet Rainer Maria Rilke
Falke, Sturm oder großer Gesang – The Poet Rainer Maria Rilke (Seminar)
Life and work of the poet Rainer Maria Rilke are intimately connected. Influenced by the thought of Friedrich Nietzsche, the works of Sigmund Freud and C.G. Jung as well as Far-Eastern philosophy, he used his writings and his person as means and purpose of cognition. Like no other poet, Rilke formulated a poetics of transcendence while suffering at the same time the insufficiencies of life around him. Today, at a time of new integrated models of experiencing and search for new utopias, Rilke’s work and fame is spreading as never before. This course explores the work of Rilke and its timeless meaning for today’s reader.
Required texts: Rainer Maria Rilke, Die Gedichte. (Insel) and Rainer Maria Rilke, Die Aufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge. Hrsg. u. komm. Manfred Engel. (Reclam).
LiteratureSummer 2009
GRMN 6640 - The Art of Writing
The Art of Writing
3-week course from July 11 – July 29
Precise perception is perhaps the most important factor for a text’s success. This course will train our perception and attention to detail and will make us aware of our own talent and style in the area of (creative) writing. We will work with classic texts of different genres in order to analyze how these texts are “constructed” (perspective, choice of motifs, sound, etc.). Our observations in this area will inspire our own individual writing. Participants will learn the basics for composing reports (interview and investigation techniques, organization of material, etc.), portraits/characterizations (what characterizes a person?), and travel writings/travelogues (portrayal of landscapes and spaces). Based on this realistic and concrete foundation, we will be able to delve into creative and fictional prose. (1 unit)
Language & StylisticsSummer 2010, Summer 2011
GRMN 6646 - Celan & Bachmann ▲
Paul Celan - Ingeborg Bachmann
Celan and Bachmann are two of the most important authors of the second half of the 20th century. Almost exact contemporaries, they made significant contributions to the development of the literature of the Federal Republic, and their longstanding personal relationship can at least partially explain the aesthetic similarities between their works.
The goal of the seminar is to gain familiarity with the two authors’ works, by means of intensive close readings, as well as with their theoretical writings. Selections of Celan’s poetry, from Der Sand aus den Urnen to Schneepart will be discussed along with poems from Bachmann’s poetry collections Die gestundete Zeit and Anrufung des Grossen Bären, her short prose fiction (e.g., Simultan), and the novel Malina. Selections from their respective theoretical works (Bachmann’s Frankfurter Vorlesungen and Celan’s speeches upon accepting the Bremen and Büchner literary prizes) will also be considered. Letters and films will shed light on the biographical background and illustrate relationships to other writers. The course will, then, not only study the works of the two authors, but also offer new insights into their position in German literature of the 20th century.
Required texts: Paul Celan: Ausgewählte Gedichte / Zwei Reden. Nachwort Beda Allemann. Suhrkamp Verlag, Berlin; Ingeborg Bachmann: Gedichte, Erzählungen, Hörspiel, Essays. Pieper Verlag, München; Wolfgang Emmerich: Paul Celan (rororo Monographien), Rowohlt Verlag; Hans Höller: Ingeborg Bachmann (rororo Monographien), Rowohlt Verlag.
LiteratureSummer 2012
GRMN 6647 - German Art & Culture 1905-1945
Modernity and Anti-Modernity in German Art and Culture: 1905-1945
Avantgarde movements arrived late in German art, but after 1905 the country saw an explosion of an avantgarde which was closely linked to international movements such as fauvism and cubism. Until 1933 the country lived a particularly radical art manifesting itself especially in the Brücke group in Dresden and Berlin, the Blaue Reiter group in Munich, the Bauhaus academy and the realistic tendencies of the 1920s. All of this was interrupted when the national socialists seized power in 1933. They prosecuted and forbid most forms of contemporary art. Nevertheless there are certain continuities before and after 1933. Looking at the works of art and certain key texts we are going to explore the explosion of the modernity and its destruction until 1945, a key period in German art, which still affects our aesthetic way of thinking in Germany until today. (1 unit)
Required texts: A coursepack will be made available.
Area StudiesSummer 2011
GRMN 6649 - Politics & Society in Germany
Politics and Society in German
3-week course, second summer session
The course offers a survey of the German political system, with an emphasis on some of its peculiar, unique features and institutions. To enable participants to get a deeper understanding of their practical relevance and real-life consequences, we will look at them from three perspectives: (1) we will compare them with their counterparts in the US system, (2) we will discuss their rationale (historical, cultural, ideological ...), and (3) we will consider the relationship between social forces and politics in Germany, among other things by way of analyzing some recent public debates about political issues and scandals in Germany.
You will thus acquire systematic factual knowledge about the German political and social system, including some of its less obvious, but nonetheless important elements. In addition, you will learn to understand why the German system and the German political culture are so different from those in the US, and why many Germans tend to think that this is a desirable difference. And last, but not least, you will acquire, or deepen your knowledge of, the German vocabulary and way of speaking about political and social issues, including idiomatic peculiarities. (1 unit)
Required Texts: Manfred G. Schmidt, "Das politische System Deutschlands", 2nd ed. Munich: C. H. Beck 2011 (1st ed. 2007)
Area StudiesSummer 2011
GRMN 6651 - Divided Germany 1945-1990
Two States - One Nation: The History of a Divided Germany 1945-1990
- Zwei Staaten - eine Nation: Zur Geschichte des geteilten Deutschlands 1945-1990
A survey of the development of the Bundesrepublik Deutschland and the Deutsche Demokratische Republik from their founding in 1949 to the unification on October 3, 1990. The most important characteristics of both systems such as parliamentary democracy vs. Realer Sozialismus, social market economy vs. planned economy, NATO membership vs. membership in the Warschauer Pakt will be analyzed and discussed against the background of the East-West-conflict. Other topics include the youth culture, the role of women, the educational systems, the media as well as attitudes towards consumerism and recreational activities in both states. (1 Unit)
Required text: Jürgen Weber, Kleine Geschichte Deutschlands seit 1945 (Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag).
Recommended text: Deutsche Geschichte im 20. Jahrhundert. Ein Lexikon. Hg. von Axel Schildt (Verlag C.H. Beck).
Summer 2008
GRMN 6652 - Berlin-Cult Metro: 1900-2000
Berlin – Cultural Metropolis: 1900-2000 (Seminar)
Berlin occupies an exceptional place in German history. The course explores selected chapters from different periods and areas of Berlin’s cultural history such as Berlin expressionism; die goldenen Zwanziger Jahre; clubs, cabarets and revues; Berlin as Cinematic center of Germany: Jewish Life in Berlin; Literatur Cafés; Berlin during the 3rd Reich; art districts (Prenzlauer Berg and Kreuzberg); the building and fall of the wall; and the cultural profile of present-day Berlin. In addition to literary texts, examples are drawn from the fine arts, music and film.
Required text: A prepared reader will be made available
Recommended text: Hans Michael Speier, Berlin mit deinen frechen Feuern. 100 Berlin Gedichte (Reclam).
Area StudiesSummer 2009
GRMN 6654 - European Idea EU & Euro
Project Europe: The European Union and the Role of Germany in the Process of European Integration - Projekt Europa: Die europäische Union und die Rolle Deutschlands im europäischen Integrationsprozess
Based on the background of the historical development of the European Union, the course explores the origins of the EU, its membership including future applicants, the election process for the European parliament as well as its limitations of power, and the reasons why some EU countries do not use the Euro. In addition to questions concerning institutional, legal and economical aspects, problems of European identity will be discussed including the question of unity and diversity in European history and culture. Emphasis will be placed on the German part in the process of European integration. (1 Unit)
Required texts: Wolf D. Gruber / Wichard Woyke: Europa-Lexikon. Länder-Politik-Institutionen. 2. erw. Aufl. (Verlag H.C. Beck); Franz Knipping, Rom, 25. März 1957. Die Einigung Europas (Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag)
Summer 2008
GRMN 6660 - Travel Literature
Discoveries, Expeditions, Transits - Travel Literature - Entdeckungen, Expeditionen, Uebergänge und -fahrten - Reiseliteratur mit Fokus auf den amerikanischen Kontinent (Literatur, Film und Kunst)
Adventures of traveling and exploring, exciting or uncanny encounters with foreign lands, somber scenes of cultural conflict have made travel literature one of the most intriguing genres. Travel literature reflects the experience of foreign cultures, but also exposes the fact that such experience is shaped by the traveler’s (and writer’s) own cultural background. Therefore travel literature sheds light not only on foreign cultures and regions, but on the familiar world from which the journey began as well. This course focuses on German travel literature about exploration, real or fictitious, of the American continents. Strategies of representation of the foreign, reaching from the documentary to the fantastic, from fact to fiction, will be investigated. Literature, films and works of art will also be discussed. (1 Unit)
Texts: Kehlmann: Die Vermessung der Welt (Rowohlt); von Kleist: Die Verlobung in St. Domingo. Das Bettelweib von Locarno. Der Findling. (Reclam); Roth: Hiob. Roman eines einfachen Mannes (dtv); Handke: Der kurze Brief zum langen Abschied (Suhrkamp); Federspiel: Die Ballade von der Typhoid Mary (Suhrkamp).
Summer 2008
GRMN 6662 - Cultural History East Prussia ▲
Prussia from the Margins: A Cultural History of East Prussia
3-week course, 1st session, July 5 - July 26
This course provides an insight into the fascinating cultural legacy of the “Atlantis of the North”: East Prussia. Immanuel Kant, Käthe Kollwitz, Siegfried Lenz, Hannah Arendt: They represent the former easternmost Prussian and later German province’s multi-ethnic traditions. In the late 19th century, East Prussia was in the focus of nationalist claims and debates. East Prussia represents an ideal case study for the gradual demise of a diverse culture being overturned by nationalism and racism. In 1945, at the end of the Nazi years, East Prussia finally disappeared from the geographical map. This course will look at East Prussia’s past in culture, literature and ethnic traditions and what to what extent the region still matters for Germans, Poles, Lithuanians and Russians alike.
Required Text: Lenz, Siegfried: Heimatmuseum. München 2006 (dtv)
Kossert, Andreas: Ostpreußen. Geschichte und Mythos. München 2007 (pantheon) Lipscher, Winfried/Kazimierz Brakoniecki (Hgg.): Meiner Heimat Gesicht. München 1996. [alternatively:Zweite Ausgabe: Ostpreußen im Spiegel der Menschen und Landschaft. Meiner Heimat Gesicht. Augsburg (?) 2000 (Weltbild)] Manthey, Jürgen: Königsberg. Geschichte einer Weltbürgerrepublik. München 2006 (dtv)
Additionally, a reader will be made available.
Area StudiesSummer 2012
GRMN 6665 - German Art From 1780 to 1880
Defining /das Deutsche/ in German Art: Germany’s Romantic Century and Its Consequences (Seminar)
Germany’s romantic age marks the beginning of a cultural self-definition which is defined by contradictions. On the one side, it was inspired by Greek and Roman art; on the other side artists looked at the medieval past, and Gothic art was considered part of German identity. A similar contradiction affected the political idealists, who had fought against Napoleon, but suffered a severe disappointment with the political reality which did not permit unity and democracy on German soil. Sehnsucht and irony therefore became the trademarks of early romanticism only to be superseded at the end of the century by the pathos and chauvinism of the huge monuments the 2nd Reich erected to celebrate itself. Based on this historical background and on texts written by artists in the 19th century, the course will analyze paintings, sculptures and architecture of the time to determine what makes them typically German and how these concepts continued to influence art in the 20th century.
Required texts: A prepared reader will be made available.
Area StudiesSummer 2009
GRMN 6668 - German Lit from 1945-1968
"Gruppe 47" in Context: German Literature from 1945-1968
The "Gruppe 47" was the most important and most powerful literary association in western Germany after World War II. During 20 years (1947 – 1967) its founder and organiser Hans Werner Richter invited writers to meetings, where unpublished texts were read and afterwards discussed by an audience of colleagues and literary critics. In our course we’ll study the works of some of the best-known members (like Günter Eich, Heinrich Böll, Ingeborg Bachmann, Ilse Aichinger, Martin Walser, Günter Grass, Hans Magnus Enzensberger, Peter Weiss, Peter Bichsel) and try to reflect the mechanisms of the literary scene, the „business of literature“. The course will also give a survey of German cultural history in this period. (1 unit)
Required Texts: Grass, Das Treffen in Telgte (dtv); Walser, Ehen in Philippsburg (Suhrkamp); Weiss, Die Verfolgung und Ermordung des Jean Paul Marat (Suhrkamp)
LiteratureSummer 2011
GRMN 6669 - German Love Poetry
German Love Poetry
This course focuses on love poems from three centuries; from Goethe to Enzensberger, from Droste-Hülshoff bis Mayröcker. One focus will be on “poetic couples” who engaged in the dialogue of love via poems: Gottfried Benn and Else Lasker-Schüler; Paul Celan and Ingeborg Bachmann.
Required Texts: Es schlug mein Herz.” Deutsche Liebeslyrik. Hg. Hans Wagener. (reclam, 2005)
LiteratureSummer 2010
GRMN 6672 - Heinrich von Kleist
Heinrich von Kleist
This course offers a survey of Kleist’s diverse oeuvre. Students will read one exemplary text, for each of Kleist’s different genres: the comedy Der zerbrochene Krug, the tragedy Penthesilea, the novella Die Verlobung in St. Domingo and the essay Über das Marionettentheater.
Required Texts: Heinrich von Kleist, Sämtliche Werke und Briefe in einem Band. Hg. Helmut Sembdner. (dtv, 2001).
LiteratureSummer 2010
GRMN 6673 - Outsiders Contemp Lit & Film
GRMN 6674 - Literary Kiss Middle Age-Prsnt ▲
"Literarische Kuesse": Literary Kiss Constellations from the Middle Ages to the Present*
"You kiss by the book", says Juliet to Romeo in Shakespeare's tragedy. What is the relationship between kisses and books? We will explore this controversial and delicate subject and discuss striking examples from the German Middle Ages to the present.
Comparing literary kisses of crucial importance and throwing light on their historical difference we will scrutinize the sublime phenomenon of kisses to gain insight into the literary and cultural history of gender, focussing first on medieval and baroque literary kisses, followed by examples from 1800 up to contemporary writing.
A reader will be provided
LiteratureSummer 2012
GRMN 6680 - German Romanticism
German Romanticism
The Kunstmärchen is used as an introduction into the literature and culture of the German Romantik. Compared to the Volksmärchen, the Kunstmärchen is characterized by self-reflection and a utopian perspective, and it contains essential elements of romantic fiction. In addition to the analysis of the texts, central concepts and topics of romanticism are explored such as: Romantic irony, Universalpoesie, magic, nature symbolism, the Doppelgänger motif, and the role of madness and dream. The discussion includes poetry, short theoretical essays as well as examples from painting and music. (1 unit)
Required texts: Gerhard Kaiser, Literarische Romantik , 2010 (Vandenhoek & Ruprecht); Ludwig Tieck, Der blonde Eckbert. Der Runenberg (Reclam, UB 7732); E.T.A. Hoffmann, Der goldene Topf (Reclam, UB 101); Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué, Undine(Reclam,UB 492); Adelbert von Chamisso, Peter Schlehmihls wundersame Geschichte (Reclam, UB 93)
LiteratureSummer 2008, Summer 2011
GRMN 6681 - Seminar: Faust
Faust
Goethe’s Faust is considered to be a pivotal work of German literature. For about 200 years it has remained in the public consciousness and maintained in the public an amazing vigour and actuality. The major focus of this seminar about Faust 1 is a careful analysis of the text which will consider structure, style, and language as well as aspects of versification and dramaturgy. Origin and sources will be discussed as well biographical and historical background and the place of the drama in Goethe’s Gesamtwerk. Film versions of famous Faust productions will be compared, and different critical responses to Faust will be explored as well as the “modernity” of the play.
Required Text : Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust: Der Tragödie Erster Teil. (Reclam Nr.1.); Ulrich Gaier, /Kommentar zu Goethes Faust. (Reclam Nr. 8183)
LiteratureSummer 2010
GRMN 6684 - Gn Poetry 20th Cent
Poetry in the 20th Century - Lyrik des 20. Jahrhunderts
The seminar explores changing concepts and traditions of German poetry in the 20th century and focuses on exemplary analysis of poetic texts by poets including Hofmannsthal, Rilke, Benn, Brecht, Bachmann, Celan, Enzensberger and Grass as well as texts known as konkrete Poesie. The course introduces basic concepts and terminology used for literary analysis and demonstrates different methodological approaches to the interpretation of poetic text. Authors will be introduced with their literary and historical background.
Required texts: Deutsche Lyrik. Eine Anthologie. Hg. von Hanspeter Brode (Suhrkamp); Dieter Burdorf, Einführung in die Gedichtanalyse (Verlag J.B. Metzler).
Summer 2008
GRMN 6689 - Films Weimar Republic to Today
Berlin Then and Now: Films from the Weimar Republic until Today
As from the second half of the 19th century, when Berlin rose to a metropolis and became the political, economic and scientific capital of the newly founded German Empire, it has experienced frequent and radical changes in parallel with key German developments. Thus, recent German history can be analysed like a geological stratum in Berlin’s texture. From films directed mostly in Berlin and with a Berlin plot like “Kuhle Wampe”, “Die Mörder sind unter uns”, “Eins, zwei, drei”, up to „Good-by Lenin“, and „Das Leben der Anderen“, we will carry out a chronological survey of the city as from the Weimar Republic, the Nazi era, the post-war period, the divided city, the fall of the wall and reunification. The course falls into two parts: the first part will provide background information on recent German and Berlin history, the second part will discuss the films around the following main issues: contending notions of national identity, poverty, violence and tensions, political legitimacy, memory.
Required Texts:
1) Benjamin, Walter: Berliner Kindheit um neunzehnhundert. Publisher: Suhrkamp
2) Kästner, Erich: Emil und die Detektive. Publisher: Dressler
3) Kracauer, Siegfried: Strassen in Berlin und anderswo. Publisher: Suhrkamp
Summer 2010
GRMN 6690 - Teaching Grmn Foreign Language
Methods of Teaching German as a Foreign Language
3-week course, first summer session
This course analyses and discusses various approaches to, and principles of teaching German language, culture and literary texts. Particular emphasis will be given to the following issues: self-perspective of teachers and learners, learning strategies, ethnographic projects, classroom interaction, literacy development, and the student as an active participant. The discussion will be accompanied by activities and projects that can be implemented directly in the language classroom.
(1 unit)
Required text: Koeppel, Deutsch als Fremdsprache – Spracherwerblich reflektierte Unterrichtspraxis (Schneider Verlag, Hohengehren, 2010); other material will be made available.
PedagogySummer 2009, Summer 2011
GRMN 6691 - Teaching Landeskunde ▲
Methods of Teaching "Landeskunde"
3-week course, 2nd session, July 26-August 16
This course analyses and discusses various approaches to, and principles of teaching German language, culture and literary texts. Particular emphasis will be given to the following issues: self-perspective of teachers and learners, learning strategies, ethnographic projects, classroom interaction, literacy development, and the student as an active participant. The discussion will be accompanied by activities and projects that can be implemented directly in the language classroom.
Required texts: Landeskunde Deutschland 2012, Renate Luscher.
PedagogySummer 2012
