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Selected Graduate Course Descriptions

Spring Semester 2006

Graduate Course Descriptions

(For Undergraduate Course Descriptions click here)

312: Second Semester Dutch for Grad Students, 3 cr.
Lecturer, Lec 1, MTWR, 12:05

Prerequisites: Graduate Student and German 111 or 311 or consent of instructor.
See description and textbooks for German 112 in Undergrad Course Description.

314: Fourth Semester Dutch for Grad Students, 3 cr.
Taylor, Lec 1, MTWF, 12:05
Prerequisites: Graduate Student and German 213 or 313 or consent of instructor.
See description and textbooks for German 214 in Undergrad Course Description..

392: German for Graduate Reading Knowledge II, 3 cr.
Love, Lec 1, MWF 11:00

Prerequisites: Senior or Graduate student plus German 391 or consent of instructor.

This is the second course in a two-semester sequence (German 391 and 392) that is designed to help graduate students develop the skills needed to read German scholarly writing. The course is primarily intended to enable graduate students to satisfy the foreign language reading requirement of their department. German 392 includes extensive practice in reading authentic passages drawn from various disciplines in the humanities. Speaking, writing, and listening skills are excluded. German 391 and 392 are self-contained; i.e., German 391 does not serve as a prerequisite for multi-skill courses such as German 203 or 273. German 391 and 392 may not be applied to a graduate minor in German.

Required Textbooks:

  • Jannach & Korb, German for Reading Knowledge, 4th edition, Heinle & Heinle Publishers

Recommended Textbooks:

  • German-English/English-German Dictionary (Harper-Collins 3d. ed.)

401: First Semester German for Graduate Students, 3 cr.
Lecturer, Lec 1, MTWRF, 8:50  
Lecturer, Lec 2, MTWRF, 9:55
Lecturer, Lec 3, MTWRF, 11:00
Lecturer, Lec 4, MTWRF, 12:05
Lecturer, Lec 5, MTWRF, 2:25  

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

See course description for German 101 in Undergraduate Course Description.

402: Second Semester German for Graduate Students, 3 cr.
Lecturer, Lec 1 MTWRF,9:55  
Lecturer, Lec 2 MTWRF,11:00
Lecturer, Lec 3 MTWRF,12:05
Lecturer, Lec 4 MTWRF,2:25 
Lecturer, Lec 5 MTWRF,7-8:20PM

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

See course description for German 102 in Undergraduate Course Description.

403: Third Semester German for Graduate Students, 3 cr.
Lecturer, Lec 1, MTWF, 9:55  
Lecturer, Lec 2, MTWF, 12:05
Lecturer, Lec 3, MTWF,  2:25 

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

See course description for German 203 in Undergraduate Course Description.

404: Fourth Semester German for Graduate Students, 3 cr
Lecturer, Lec 1, MTWF, 9:55,    
Lecturer, Lec 2, MTWF,1:20,    
Lecturer, Lec 3, MW, 7-8:40pm,

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

See course description for German 204 in Undergraduate Course Description.

625: Topic in Dutch Literature:Nederlandstalige literatuur 2e W.O.-heden, 3-4 cr.
Taylor, Lec 1, MWF 2:25               
Taylor, Dis 301, T 11:00                     

Prerequisites: German 314 or consent of instructor.                       

This course offers readings and discussion of an array of post-WWII Dutch-language fiction that represents a number of major writers of the period, and that investigate a range of themes that were current in the Low Countries: WWII and memories thereof, the aftermath in Europe of the Colonial period, identity and relationships between ethnic groups/subcultures, the appropriate role of law in society, whether and how one recovers from tragic events. These texts represent a range of literary styles and approaches, from tightly constructed to much more expansive, from historical fiction to the detective novel. These works each in their own ways both conceal from, and reveal to, the reader their own concerns. We will discuss both what these issues are and how each author constructs the work to achieve the desired effects.

This course is intended for students who will read the novels and participate in a discussion each week in Dutch. Thus, the prerequisite is German 214 or 314, or consent instructor.

Required Textbooks:

  • Harry Mulisch: De Aanslag.  De Bezige Bij, 2005.  ISBN: 9023418182
  • Cees Nooteboom: Het volgende verhaal.  Atlas, 2000.  ISBN: 9029535520
  • H.M. van den Brink: Over het water.  Amstel Uitgevers, 2003.  ISBN: 9029072970
  • Abdelkader Benali: Bruiloft aan zee.  Poema pocket, 2005.  ISBN: 9025419011
  • Arthur Japin: De zwarte met het witte hart.  Arbeiderspers, 2004.  ISBN: 9029522887
  • Renate Dorrestein: Een hart van steen.  Contact, 2002.  ISBN: 902541110X
  • Helga Ruebsamen: Het lied en de waarheid.  Contact, 2003.  ISBN: 902541480X
  • Janwillem van de Wetering: Hard Rain (Paperback).  Publisher: Soho Crime; Reprint edition  (October, 1997) ISBN: 1569471045

651: Introduction to Middle High German, 3 cr.
Calomino, Lec 1, MWF 9:55                

Prerequisites: Advanced knowledge of German.

This course will introduce students to Middle High German grammar and vocabulary with the goals of fluency and accuracy in reading medieval texts.  Lectures and discussions will cover topics in phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon.  During the course of the semester students will read Das Nibelungenlied and a representative selection from various genres of Middle High German literature.  Class time will be devoted to translation and to discussion of grammatical/lexical topics.  Participants will write mid-semester and final examinations. 

Required Textbooks:

  • Weinhold/Ehrismann/Moser, Kleine mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik. (Braumüller)
  • Lexer, Mittelhochdeutsches Taschenwörterbuch.  (Hirzel)
  • Weddige, Mittelhochdeutsch.  Eine Einführung.  (C.H. Beck)
  • Bartsch/De Boor, ed. Das Nibelungenlied.  (Brockhaus)

Recommended Textbooks:

  • Hennig, Kleines Mittelhochdeutsches Wörterbuch (Niemeyer)
  • Paul/Wiehl/Grosse, Mittelhochdeutsche Grammatik. (Niemeyer)
  • Saran/Nagel, Das Übersetzen aus dem Mittelhochdeutschen. (Niemeyer)

711: Special Topics in German Literature: Citoyen Schillers aesthetische Revolution, 3 cr.
Berghahn, Lec 1, MW 1:00-2:15

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

Um eine gegenwartsbezogene Perspektive auf Schiller zu gewinnen, welche rueckblickend unsere Kultur in einer Tradition erkennt, dazu beduerfte es einer kulturkritischen Betrachtung, wie sie Schiller fuer seine Zeit am Anfang seiner Aesthetischen Briefe vornahm. Ob diese sich kulturkonservativ gegen die Amerikanisierung und Banalisierung der Kultur oder kulturkritisch gegen die Folgen des Spaetkapitalism richtet, lasse ich dahingestellt; nur duerfte sie nicht auf einen schlechten Traditionalismus hinauslaufen, der das schillernde Alte als das eigentlich Aktuelle anpreist und das rebellische Neue als den Talmiglanz gegenwaertiger Kultur blosstellt.  Man dient Schiller nicht, indem man ihn nur antiquarisch behandelt oder ihn aktualisierend als modern ausschreit. Das eine ist so falsch wie das andere. Man muss sehen welche Faehrten er legte, die Spuren seines Werks bis in die Gegenwart verfolgen, um zu erkennen, was er oder seine Werke noch wert sind. Nicht alles,was Schiller schrieb, ist “klassisch”, auch wenn es von Traditionalisten vergoldet wurde. Unter der Patina seiner Werke  mag noch maches verborgen liegen, was eine archaelogischen Betrachtung verdient .Man muss also Schiller gegen seine Verehrer in Schutz nehmen, um ihn als Dichter ernst zu nehmen. Schiller mit neuen Augen zu sehen  ist die Absicht dieser Vorlesung..

Required Textbooks:

  • Friedrich Schiller: Saemtliche Werke in fuenf Baenden. Hrsg. von Peter A. Alt u.a., dtv. ISBN 3-423 59068-8

711: Special Topics in German Literature: Heinrich und Thomas Mann, 3 cr.
Hermand, Lec 2, TR 2:30-3:45

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

Die vielfältig verschlungenen, sich wechselseitig ergänzenden und zugleich kontrastierenden Biographien von Thomas und Heinrich Mann sollen in dieser Vorlesung stets vor dem Hintergrund der deutschen Geschichte des frühen 20. Jahrhunderts schlechthin gesehen werden. Neben einzelnen genaueren Werkanalysen werden deshlab auch die verschiedenen politischen und publizistischen Tätigkeiten der beidne Brüder herangezogen, um an ihnen den exemplarischen Lernprizeß zweier bedeutender „kritischer Realisten“ vom Zweiten Kaiserreich über den Ersten Weltkrieg, die Weimarer Republik, den heraufziehenden Raschismus, das Exil bes zur Situation nach 1945 zu illustrieren.

RequiredTextbooks:

  • Mann, Thomas: Buddenbrooks. Verfall einer Familie. Fischer, 2004. ISBN 3-596-29431-2
  • Mann, Thomas: Die Erzählungen. Fischer, 2005. ISBN 3-10-048514-9
  • Mann, Thomas: Doktor Faustus. Fischer, 2001. ISBN 3-596-29428-2
  • Mann, Heinrich: Der Untertan. Fischer, 1996. ISBN 3-596-13640-7
  • Mann, Heinrich: Im Schlaraffenland. Fischer, 2001. ISBN 3-596-25928-2
  • Mann, Heinrich: Die Jugend des Königs Henri Quatre. Fischer, 2002. ISBN 3-596-10118-2

727: Teaching/Learning Foreign Language Culture, 3 cr.
Chavez, Lec 1, MW 8:00-9:15

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

This course does not focus on how to teach culture. Although such information may be induced from the readings, assignments, and discussions, course participants will primarily concern themselves with a critical review of several issues pertaining to teaching/learning foreign-language culture.

We will begin with a look at various definitions of culture, including whether a special definition of “culture” is used and/or required in the foreign-language-teaching/learning context. For example, we will question the appropriateness of connecting the term “culture” with a particular (target) language, an association which leaves unaddressed the problematic nature of national cultures and sub- and multicultural societies and multinational languages. We will also ask whether students, teachers, and the “profession” agree on the appropriate scope of “culture” for the specific purposes of language teaching and why – if, as is commonly claimed, “culture and language are inextricably interwoven” – language teachers/learners need to worry about teaching/learning “culture” at all.

We will also examine how the teaching of culture relates to our professional mission, such as set forth in the National Standards but also, more specifically, in rationales of the “foreign-language requirement”. We will juxtapose the lofty goal of educating global citizens with the more cynical view of teaching culture as a sales pitch to counter dwindling enrollments, with the ultimate conclusion –put into practice by some institutions – that the “culture course” can replace the “language course”.

The “content” and “sequencing” of “cultural instruction” will also be scrutinized. For example, whereas most teachers (for better or for worse) share a vision of how “grammar” and “vocabulary” ought to be distributed over the language-program sequence, there is less certainty about the content and sequencing of “culture”, especially after the first-year (so-called) “topics” of “survival, traditions, foods, and holidays” have been left behind (or not).  Despite the National Standards’ optimistic descriptions of  growth in cultural knowledge, the reality of most classrooms and the desires of most students leave us wondering (1) whether we are too bound by positive and negative stereotypes, both those that others have of a given group and those that a group has of itself (auto-stereotypes); (2) whether the desire not to offend or the desire to exploit to the fullest the salability of “culture”, leads us to sanitize or over-simplify cultural elements; and (3) whether we are indeed doomed to “discuss”, often with stupefying superficiality a limited range of “topics”, such as the “environment” or “gender/women’s rights”, at every level of instruction beyond first year.

We will also raise issues more directly related to teaching practices, such as how native as compared to non-native speaker teachers present (in practice or perception) “cultural information” and how they act or are seen as representatives, ambassadors, advocates, or defenders of the target culture; whether culture can only be experienced “subjectively” or whether it can be adequately abstracted and generalized; whether/how to use L1 in cultural instruction, especially at the lower levels; how learners, teachers, native speakers (of the TL), and “cultural artifacts” can take part in cultural exploration (and e.g., whether to ab/use community members who speak the TL as “cultural informants”); and how/whether to test cultural knowledge.

There will be regular class readings and discussions, a take-home exam, a small teaching/research project, and various smaller “hands-on” and writing assignments.  Readings will be compiled in a reading pack, available for purchase.

758: Topics in contemporary German: Dialectology, 3 cr.
Macha, Lec 1, MWF 11:00

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

In unserem Kurs werden wir anhand Originaltexten typische Eigenarten der geschriebenen deutschen Sprache analysieren und ansatzweise erklären. Dabei liegt der Schwerpunkt auf der Schreibe deutscher Immigranten des 19. Jahrhunderts, also im wesentlichen auf der Sprache „kleiner Leute“, Sprachhistorisch interessant wird es sein, die grammatischen und lexikalischen Entwicklungswege zu erkennen, die die deutsche Sprache bis zur Gegenwart durchlaufen hat. Das Datenmaterial entstammt zu einem beträchtlichen Teil den Sammlungen des Max Kade Institutes und der State Historical Society in Madison/Wisconsin, es liegt in einer Form vor, die amerikanischen Studierenden einen guten Zugang ermöglicht.

804: Interdisciplinary Western European Area Studies Seminar, 3 cr.

Louden, Salmons and Howell, Sem 1, R 9:30-11:20      

Prerequisites: Graduate Student or Consent of Instructor.

Topic: The German Language and Immigration in International Perspective.

German-speaking immigrants have been coming to Wisconsin since before statehood and still come today-from Old Order Amish to urban Europeans. In Germany, immigration since the 1960s has created significant populations of speakers of Turkish, Russian, Romani, and other languages, while German-speaking communities still exist as far east as Siberia. We will examine the linguistic consequences of immigration in those cases: German-speaking immigration to Wisconsin, contemporary immigration to Germany, and German Sprachinseln in Eastern Europe and Latin America.  While our core perspective is linguistic, we will rely heavily on insights from sociologists, geographers, historians, and others. The goal is not simply to integrate and synthesize various disciplinary approaches to the problem, but also to bring German-American Studies and contemporary German/European problems together in a novel and constructive way. This seminar is sponsored by the DAAD Center for German and European Studies and will be taught jointly by videolink with colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Viadrina University (Frankfurt/Oder), and the Free University of Berlin.

Covington, Sem 2, W 11:00-2:00

Prerequisites: Graduate Student or consent of instructor.

Topic: Consumerism and Environmentalism in a Globalizing Europe.

The Politics of the Consumer and the Green Voter:

This graduate seminar will introduce students to comparative transatlantic consumerism and environmentalism. The course will be broadly interdisciplinary, beginning with historical works on how Europeans and Americans have related to the acts of consumption and the social construction of their relationship to land, water and other resources. Our objective is to see how these relationships can become politicized, and more importantly, how globalization may be changing this politicization. Selected works include scholarship from the disciplines of history, geography, public policy, sociology, consumer science, communications studies, and recent governmental directives. Examples include Mark Cioc, the Rhine: an Eco-Biography and Victoria de Grazia, Irresistible Empire: America’s Advance through 20th Century Europe.

960: Seminar in German Linguistics: Pennsylvania German Language and Culture, 3 cr.
Louden, Sem 1, TR  1:00-2:15                   

Prerequisites: German 939.

Pennsylvania German, better known as Pennsylvania Dutch, is currently spoken by over 200,000 people in the United States and Canada and is one of the very few minority languages in North America to thrive alongside English and French. In this course we will explore the linguistic and cultural situation of various Pennsylvania Dutch-speaking groups from both contemporary and historical perspectives. We will begin by considering the beginnings of Pennsylvania Dutch during the eighteenth century, and then move more or less chronologically up to the present. All important areas of Pennsylvania Dutch folklife will be considered, including vernacular architecture, folklore, religion, political culture, tourism, and, of course, language and literature. Each component of the course will be complemented by short Pennsylvania Dutch texts.

Required Textbooks:

  • Pennsylvania German Dictionary, Eugene S. Stine (ISBN: 0911122613; 1996),
  • A course reader

970: Advanced Seminar in German Linguistics: German Language and Immigration in International Perspective, 3 cr.
Louden, Salmons and Howell, Sem 1, R 9:30-11:20                     

Prerequisites: Graduate Student.

German-speaking immigrants have been coming to Wisconsin since before statehood and still come today-from Old Order Amish to urban Europeans. In Germany, immigration since the 1960s has created significant populations of speakers of Turkish, Russian, Romani, and other languages, while German-speaking communities still exist as far east as Siberia. We will examine the linguistic consequences of immigration in those cases: German-speaking immigration to Wisconsin, contemporary immigration to Germany, and German Sprachinseln in Eastern Europe and Latin America.  While our core perspective is linguistic, we will rely heavily on insights from sociologists, geographers, historians, and others. The goal is not simply to integrate and synthesize various disciplinary approaches to the problem, but also to bring German-American Studies and contemporary German/European problems together in a novel and constructive way. This seminar is sponsored by the DAAD Center for German and European Studies and will be taught jointly by videolink with colleagues at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Viadrina University (Frankfurt/Oder), and the Free University of Berlin.

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