Participating Institutes and Departments
Institut für deutsche Sprache und Literatur I [Universität zu Köln]
The Institutes for German Language and Literature I and II (IDSL I & II) are centralized in the Subject Group 3 for German Language and Literature and belong to the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Cologne. They accommodate the whole range of subdisciplines and courses in German studies. With approximately 7450 students (winter semester 2020/2021), the IDSL I & II belong to the largest institutions of their kind in Germany. The IDSL I, on the one hand, is subdivided into four departments: German Language and Literature of the Middle Ages and Early Modern Age, German Linguistics, Modern German Literature and Subject Didactics. In addition, there is a manifold job-related course offer for students which is completed by the option to contribute to the institutes’ own publication organs, the literary journal schliff and the online culture magazine Stellwerk. The IDSL mainly coordinates the bachelor’s and master’s degree ‘German Language and Literature’, the German teaching degrees for secondary schools and the specialized master’s degrees ‘Theories and Practices of Professional Writing’ (TUPPS), ‘German Language and Literature in Central Europe’ ‘Medieval Studies’ and ‘Linguistics’. The IDSL II, on the other hand, is separated into the three research and teaching foci Literature Didactics, Language Didactics, and Inclusive Didactics of German. This subject-specific context also makes up the framework for the institute’s special research facilities including the ‘Research Department for children- and youth-oriented Media‘ (ALEKI), the ‘Research Department for Language Development and Didactics’ and the ‘Mercator-Institute for Language Promotion and German as a Second Language’. Furthermore, the IDSL II coordinates the German teaching degrees for primary, main and special-needs schools. Both the IDSL I and the IDSL II are globally interconnected and therefore offer students a variety of opportunities to spend a part of their studies abroad, e. g. in the context of an ERASMUS semester. Moreover, the associated faculty libraries with their extensive range of current and canonical literature promote purposeful research for scientific writing and an immersion in methodological questions of all subdisciplines of German studies.
Responsible for the project:
Prof. Dr. Anja Lemke
anja.lemke(at)uni-koeln(dot)de
Prof. Dr. Monika Schausten
The Department of German Studies [Tucson - University of Arizona]
The Department of German Studies, a part of the College of Humanities, sees as its major academic goals the instruction of students (1) in German language at the beginning and intermediate levels, (2) in German literature and cultural studies at the upper division, MA, and PhD levels, and (3) in applied linguistics (theoretical, and pedagogical) at the graduate levels.
The Department of German Studies offers two graduate programs: one leading to the Master of Arts degree in German Studies, and a second in the PhD/DPhil dual degree in Transcultural German Studies. Within the MA and PhD program, students may choose among a number of emphases and individualized courses of study. Our curriculum includes literary studies from the medieval through the modern period, cultural studies, film studies, genre studies, applied linguistics, general linguistics, teaching methodology, and foreign language testing, as well as an introduction to and further study in a variety of critical methods. The Department of German Studies in cooperation with the College of Education offers a program by which students who complete their MA in German Studies have the unique opportunity to acquire a teaching certificate for K-12 public schools in just one or two additional semester(s). Since the PhD/DPhil dual degree program in Transcultural German Studies (TGS) requires a year of study in Germany, either at the University of Cologne or Leipzig, most students admitted to the TGS Program will spend their first year at the University of Arizona, their second year in Germany, and their third year and dissertation time in Arizona.
Responsible for the project:
Prof. Dr. Barbara Kosta
Department of German [Berkeley - University of California]
The Department of German at Berkeley has 9 faculty members, several lecturers, and more than thirty graduate students. We are mindful of our position as a foreign language and culture department within the increasingly diverse student population of our campus where currently over 75 foreign languages are spoken and taught. What is more, German culture itself has become increasingly diversified over the past sixty years as a result of migration, European integration, and globalization.
Critically aware of this unprecedented diversification of German culture, as well as our positions both within and outside it, we attempt in our teaching, research, and advising to tap the creative energies that arise from cultural differences not only between the US and the German-speaking nations of Europe, but also among the multi-ethnic cultural communities that our students represent. In this way, the Department of German is committed to promoting thinking across cultures.
Our cross-disciplinary lens opens literature to the broader cultural environment that nourishes it. While expanding the field, we have maintained the essential role of literature within German studies and regularly teach canonical works of German-language authors from 1200 to the present. Throughout our research, courses, and colloquia, we seek to mediate between the analysis of literature as historical product and the appreciation of literary language on its own terms; between close textual analysis and theory-driven inquiries; between high culture and popular media; and between scholarship and social engagement. Our dissertations show that we embrace diverse methodological and theoretical perspectives. What unites us is our commitment — in the open spirit of UC Berkeley — to continually explore new ways of thinking about the field and our position in it.
Responsible for the project:
Prof. Dr. Karen Feldman
The Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures [Yale University]
The Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures at Yale has long been considered one of the strongest departments of German in the United States. While emphasizing the practice and theory of reading and interpretation with a rigorous study of canonical, and also non-canonical, works of German literature, the department also encompasses and encourages within its own framework the intensive study of interdisciplinary fields such as critical theory and philosophy, comparative approaches to literature, the histories of science and law, social and political thought. Film and media studies are a focus in the German/Film program as well as within the department. In our close-knit intellectual community the faculty works with each of its students to develop a course of study that combines those elements of German thought and culture that most reflect the individual’s interests. Our goal is to allow as much freedom as possible while assuring the completion of a degree that will have thoroughly prepared the student for a strong entrance into the profession. Over the years our record in placing our graduates has been superb.
Responsible for the project:
Prof. Dr. Kirk Wetters