Course Offerings for 2009-2010:

Summer 2009:

• Language Study Abroad (LSA): see Programs in Berlin (German 3, 5, 6). Directed by Klaus Mladek.

• German 8. Advanced Language Skills. Taught at 9 by Bruce Duncan. Designed to develop facility in oral expression and writing; emphasis on vocabulary expansion and reinforcement of grammatical structures. The course will draw much of its material from the web, as well as from television films and more traditional print media. These works will serve as a basis for discussion and frequent writing assignments about contemporary linguistic, cultural, social, and political issues. Not open to returning FSP participants. WCult: W. Here is a not-wholly-finished version of the syllabus.




• German 46. The German Novel (in English Translation). Taught at 10 by Bruce Duncan. "The 20th-Century German Novel." An introduction in translation to some of the finest German, Austrian, and Swiss novels of the 20th century, as well as some of their film adaptations: Rainer Maria Rilke's The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge, Robert Musil's The Confusions of Young Törless, several of Kafka's shorter prose works, Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain, Max Frisch's Homo Faber, Günter Grass's Cat and Mouse, and Christa Wolf's The Quest for Christa T. To discover what is modern (or pre-postmodern), German, and novelistic about the 20th-century German novel, the course will explore how these works treat broad topics like alienation, class, gender, adolescence, disease, death, memory, myth, and history as reflected in the protagonists' quest for self-knowledge, aesthetic fulfillment, or spiritual salvation. Conducted in English. By special arrangement, this course can also be used to count toward a German Studies major or minor. Open to all classes. Dist: LIT. WCult: W.
• German 85. Independent study project. Before the beginning of the term, and after consulting with a faculty member, students submit a proposal to the department.

Fall 2009:

• Foreign Study Program (FSP - German 29-31): see Programs in Berlin. Directed by Ulrike Rainer.
• German 1. Introductory German. Taught at 9S by Christopher Schnader and at 10 by Irene Kacandes. The 10 o'clock section will also use the x-hour on Thursday at 12. Introduction to written and spoken German. Intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.
• German 2. Introductory German. Taught at 10 by Veronika Fuechtner. It will also use the x-hour on Thursday at 12. Continued intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.
• German 3. Intermediate German. Taught at 11 by Christopher Schnader. Designed primarily to develop reading and speaking skills; emphasis on expansion of vocabulary and reinforcement of grammatical structures. Reading and discussion of texts of literary and cultural interest. Oral and written assignments.
• German 7. First Year Seminar. Taught at 10A by Bruce Duncan. See Special Listings.





• German 11. German Culture and Society in the 20th Century. Taught at 11 by Veronika Fuechtner. "Autobiography and Memory in 20th Century German Culture" This course investigates the close connection between culture and history from the Wilhelminian Empire to post-reunification Germany. After a brief historical introduction, we will analyze autobiographical and literary texts, artwork, films as well as contemporary architectural projects. Our readings will include among others, works by Heinrich Mann, Anna Seghers, Elias Canetti, Christa Wolf and Walter Benjamin. We will also discuss diary entries by Viktor Klemperer, who chronicled the Nazi era, artwork by Gerhardt Richter, whose paintings explore personal and national history at once, and films such as Wir Wunderkinder, a satirical portrait of the German war generation from the 1950s, or the documentary Black Box Germany on a society polarized by terrorism in the 1970s and 80s. After investigating today's young "Generation Golf," we will conclude with an analysis of architectural projects memorializing German history, e.g., by Christian Boltanski and Peter Eisenman. Conducted in German. Prerequisite: German 3, or equivalent. Open to all classes. Dist: LIT. WCult: W.



• German 43. "Continental Strangers" (cross-listed with Film Studies 42) Taught at 3A by Gerd Gemünden. During the 1930s and 1940s, hundreds of German-speaking writers and film professionals lived and worked in Hollywood. While some were emigres who came to better their lot and further their professional careers, the majority of them were Jewish refugees who escaped the threat of the Nazi death camps. Along the historical axis, we will focus on the continuities and ruptures between Weimar cinema and Hollywood. Thus we will study how the exiles' sense of (Jewish) identity in the United States was shaped not only by the experience of displacement and the fight against fascism, but also by the political climate of wartime United States and the film industry's war efforts. Along the theoretical axis, we need to question such terms as national cinema and cultural identity. Here recent discussions of postcolonial theory, exile and diaspora, hybridity, and cultural mimicry will be examined. Along the political axis, we will investigate how these films intervene in public debates, and how they reframe political issues in terms of narrative and images. This will also involve a comparative study of the culture industries of wartime Hollywood and Nazi Germany. Here is a previous version of the syllabus.
• German 85. Independent study project. Before the beginning of the term, and after consulting with a faculty member, students submit a proposal to the department.

Winter 2010:

• German 1. Introductory German. Taught at 9S by Yuliya Komska. Introduction to written and spoken German. Intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory.A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.
• German 2. Introductory German. Taught at 9S and at 10 by Christopher Schnader. The 10 o'clock section will also use the x-hour on Thursday at 12. Continued intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.


• German 10. German Culture and Society before 1900. Taught at 11 by Ellis Shookman. In 2010 Winter: "Enlightenment, Emotion, and Emancipation: German Life and Literature, 1750-1850" An introduction to the lives, times, and main works of major writers of the Golden Age of German literature, e.g., Lessing, Goethe, Schiller, Bürger, Novalis, Hölderlin, Hoffmann, Eichendorff, Heine, Kleist, Büchner, and the Brothers Grimm. Readings are taken from plays, poems, and prose that ranges from fables, fairy tales, and other short fiction to aesthetic, philosophical, and political treatises. Structured around a series of videos, this course is divided into units that address important periods in German cultural and intellectual history, i.e., the Enlightenment, Storm-and-Stress, Weimar Classicism, Romanticism, and Young Germany. Essays, oral reports, and a final exam help students develop the ability to hear, read, speak, and write educated German. Conducted in German. Shookman. Dist: LIT. WCult: W.



• German 65. Topics in 20th Century Cultural Studies. Taught at 10A by Yuliya Komska. This term's topic will be "Modes of Belonging: What is Heimat?" The seminar aims to introduce students to major issues in German culture that span the course of the twentieth century and consider them through the prism of our theme. It will further familiarize students with the methods of cultural studies, teach them how to explore a topic using different media, and improve their speaking and writing in German. The course is divided into several segments with a week at the end for oral presentations of paper topics. For each topical segment there will be primary readings in German, materials in other media, and critical texts in English. This course also counts as the culminating experience for seniors majoring in German, who will meet as a group five times over the term during the x-hour. Conducted in German. Open to all classes. Dist: LIT. WCult.
• German 85. Independent study project. Before the beginning of the term, and after consulting with a faculty member, students submit a proposal to the department.

Spring 2010:

• Language Study Abroad (LSA): see Programs in Berlin (German 3, 5, 6). Directed by Bruce Duncan.
• German 1. Introductory German. Taught at 9S. Introduction to written and spoken German. Intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.
• German 2. Introductory German. Taught at 10 by Yuliya Komska. It will also use the x-hour on Thursday at 12. Continued intensive study of basic grammar and vocabulary through readings, oral and written drills, composition exercises, conversation, and practice in the virtual laboratory. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.
• German 3. Intermediate German. Taught at 9S by Konrad Kenkel. Designed primarily to develop reading and speaking skills; emphasis on expansion of vocabulary and reinforcement of grammatical structures. Reading and discussion of texts of literary and cultural interest. Oral and written assignments. A new textbook, the 5th edition of Na klar!, by Di Donato et al., replaces the old one.



• German 9. Introduction to German Studies: From the Reformation to Reunification. Taught at 11 by Yuliya Komska. An introduction to German cultural history that examines social and historical developments from the age of Luther in the early sixteenth century to the unification of East and West Germany in 1990 as they are reflected in literature, art, music, and philosophy. Emphasis is placed on Germans' growing awareness of themselves as a nation and on an analysis of aesthetic and intellectual accomplishments that are representative of major periods in their history. May be elected as a prerequisite for the Foreign Study Program. Conducted in German. Dist: PHR. Class of 2007 and earlier: WCult: EU. Class of 2008 and later: WCult: W.



• German 13. "Beyond Good and Evil." Taught at 10 by Veronika Fuechtner and other members of the department. Borrowing its title from Nietzsche, this course examines some of the most famous and infamous figures - mythological, fictional and historical - that have profoundly shaped German identity. While exploring the lives, works, and influence of the likes of Luther, Faust, and Leni Riefenstahl, students will not only develop a greater understanding of Wagner's question "What is German?" but also learn how the answer to that question has come to epitomize notions of good and evil in general. Taught in English. WCult: CI.

• German 82. Seminar: Taught at 10A by Thea Dorn, the Max Kade Distinguished Visiting Professor. "Angry Young Women: The Contemporary German Novel - a Fräuleinwunder?" In the late 1990s, noting the increasing success of young female German writers, an important news magazine dubbed this trend the "Fräuleinwunder," and one male colleague declared it the decline of German literature. This seminar takes issue with the equation of "female writing" with "nice and harmless literature" by reading texts that deal powerfully, and in a unique language, with the most controversial issues of our times (family, history, the battle of the sexes, role identity, the working world). At the center of the course will be novels and short stories by young writers such as Juli Zeh, Julia Franck, and Jenny Erpenbeck; authors such as the Nobel Prize winners Herta Müller and Elfriede Jelinek, who became influential in the 1980s, will also be considered. Beyond that, the course hopes to encourage each student to develop his or her own critical attitude towards literary texts. Conducted in German. Dist: LIT. WCult: W.
• German 85. Independent study project. Before the beginning of the term, and after consulting with a faculty member, students submit a proposal to the department.
• German 87. Honors Thesis. Arrange.