| GRMN 102-01 |
German in Everyday Life
Instructor: Todd Bryant
Course Description:
This course is an introduction to the German language and culture of daily life. It focuses on the acquisition of language skills, such as speaking, reading, writing, and listening and does so while also learning about aspects of every-day cultures in German-speaking countries. Classes are small and emphasize communication. After successfully completing German 101 and 102, students are expected to have reached a basic level of intercultural and cross-cultural competence, that is, to be able to communicate with members of German-speaking cultures with an awareness of differences in language and culture. Classes meet five times a week. Prerequisite: 101 or the equivalent, or permission of the instructor.
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08:30 AM-09:20 AM, MTWRF
BOSLER 309 |
| GRMN 102-02 |
German in Everyday Life
Instructor: David Takamura
Course Description:
This course is an introduction to the German language and culture of daily life. It focuses on the acquisition of language skills, such as speaking, reading, writing, and listening and does so while also learning about aspects of every-day cultures in German-speaking countries. Classes are small and emphasize communication. After successfully completing German 101 and 102, students are expected to have reached a basic level of intercultural and cross-cultural competence, that is, to be able to communicate with members of German-speaking cultures with an awareness of differences in language and culture. Classes meet five times a week. Prerequisite: 101 or the equivalent, or permission of the instructor.
|
09:30 AM-10:20 AM, MTWRF
KADE SEM |
| GRMN 201-01 |
Intermediate German I: Contemporary German Cultures
Instructor: David Takamura
Course Description:
What did the Brothers Grimm do besides collecting fairy tales? How do narratives inform national identity? Why do Germans return their empty bottles to the store? Students approach such questions, which touch on language, culture, economics, geography, history, and more, through a variety of media in this course. At the same time, students review grammatical structures, expand their knowledge of stylistic forms, and practice various registers of written and spoken German. German 201 aims to develop students skills to understand and reflect upon German-language culture at a basic intermediate level. Classes meet four days a week. Prerequisite: 102 or 103, or permission of the instructor. This course fulfills the language graduation requirement.
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10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MTWR
KADE SEM |
| GRMN 202-01 |
Intermediate German II: Mediated German Cultures
Instructor: Kamaal Haque
Course Description:
What was occupied Vienna like in post-WWII Central Europe? How does a film convey fear? Is German academic writing different from how I write papers at Dickinson? Posing these or similar questions, this course builds students basic intermediate level of cultural and linguistic skill and explores the challenges of understanding and communicating with various media in colloquial, academic, and professional contexts. As it does so, students will acquire a better understanding of contemporary and historical issues, anxieties, and desires in the German-speaking world. There will be a special focus on writing in different modes, as this is a writing in the discipline (WiD) course. Prerequisite: 201, or permission of the instructor.
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10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MTWR
BOSLER 321 |
| GRMN 250-01 |
Protest! Creative activism in film and media
Instructor: Antje Pfannkuchen
Course Description:
Cross-listed with FMST 210-03. Taught in English. Filmmakers of the New German Cinema like Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Rosa von Praunheim, Volker Schlndorff and others used film as a medium of social and artistic awareness and change. They experimented in content and form to address pressing issues in society. Since then, film, video and other media have been used creatively to support a range of different protests, from feminism to climate change. We will study the origins and legacies of these imaginative forms of activism, building on them to create original statements of our own.
|
01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
BOSLER 213 |
| GRMN 251-01 |
German Orientalism: Germany and Asia from Fascination to Fascism
Instructor: David Takamura
Course Description:
This course studies the central yet mysterious role Eastern thought has had in the construction of a German nation and identity. We will explore German Orientalism's paradoxical exoticization of and identification with South and East Asian concepts and systems from the early nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. In addition to reading short writings on Asia and mysticism by artists such as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Franz Kafka, and by seminal philosophers including Friedrich Nietzsche, this course will introduce students to important Eastern ideas that influenced German thought and letters. Text, film, and painting will serve as guiding threads as we investigate and define fields and concepts such as mythology, cultural fantasy, the philosophy of language, and nihilism. More specific areas of focus will include the history behind the concept of "the Orient," the origins of Aryanism, German stereotyping of Asians, and the intersections of esotericism and fascism. (Taught in German.)
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, MR
BOSLER 222 |
| GRMN 400-01 |
Mountains in the German Cultural Imagination
Instructor: Kamaal Haque
Course Description:
In this course, we will examine how mountains are transformed from places of terror in the pre-modern period to places of pleasure and leisure today. We will consider how the presence of mountains informs German, Austria and Swiss self-identity and will talk about the ecological, economic and touristic challenges facing mountains in general and the Alps in particular. Topics will also include: how the Nazis appropriate the mountains for their propaganda purposes, how and why a Himalayan mountain has come to be known as "Der Schicksalberg der Deutschen," and the discovery of the iceman "tzi" in the Alps. We will look not only at non-fiction texts, but the mountains in fiction, film, music and visual art, as well.
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11:30 AM-12:45 PM, MW
KADE SEM |