This course highlights the chief aesthetic and intellectual accomplishments of eventful periods in German cultural history from the 19th-21st centuries. Our focus will be on all sorts of borders - physical, ideological, intellectual, political, metaphorical, textual, generational, gendered, and multicultural - and crossing borders, as passages to more creative or liberated states of being, or as transgressive acts.
We will ask, for example, how the Romantics imagined the borders of reality and fantasy, how the Modernist search for new forms both reflected and rejected these borders, and how political and ethnic borders configure contemporary Germany. On afternoon excursions, we will determine how the cultural environment of Berlin represents some of the borders and limits discussed in our readings. We will travel to the Kleist memorial on the Wannsee, visit the Alte Nationalgalerie, Jewish Museum, Brucke Museum, Bayerischer Platz, Brecht-Weigel-Museum, Wall Museum, DDR Museum, East Side Gallery, Stasi Museum, and explore the vast Turkish market in Kreuzberg. Readings and discussions will be in English.
Period
28-05-2011 - 09-07-2011 (6 weeks)
Target group
Course designed for intellectually curious, engaged students interested in the cultural and literary history of Germany in English translation. Must be willing to participate actively in discussions and excursions to sites and museums in Berlin relevant to course content. Attendance is crucial.
Course aim
This course highlights the chief aesthetic and intellectual accomplishments of eventful periods in German cultural history from the 19th-21st centuries.
Credits
6.0 ECTS creditsParticipation (attendance, preparation, discussion): 20%3 response papers: 15%Oral presentations of response papers: 15%Midterm take-home exam: 25%Final take-home exam: 25%
Course fee
EUR 1200: Tuition
EUR 250: Program fee
Course leader
Dr. Peggy Setje-Eilers
Freie Universitat Berlin FUBiS
Address: Otto-von-Simson-Str. 26
Postal code: 14195
City: Berlin
Country: Germany
Website: http://www.fubis.org/
E-mail: fubis@fubis.org
Phone: +49 + 30 + 838 73472
Borders & Crossings: German Literature and Culture from Romanticism to Present
