The Frankfurt School and Its Writers (3 credits)
16:470:643:01
Cross-listed with Comparative Literature: 16:195:617:01
Professor Nicholas Rennie
Thursdays 3:50pm - 6:50pm | AB West 4050
Work of the Frankfurt School is among the most important 20th-century German-language contributions to such fields as sociology, political science, gender studies, film, cultural studies, and comparative literature. We will read texts by such key figures of the Frankfurt School as Walter Benjamin, Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse, and Jürgen Habermas for their relevance to a number of disciplines, but give particular consideration to literary and aesthetic questions. To this end, we will also read texts by select authors to whom these figures responded (e.g. Baudelaire, Proust, Kafka, Beckett). Throughout the course, moreover, we will be examining responses to and development of the thought of the first and second generation of the Frankfurt School in more recent strands of Marxism, deconstruction, feminism, aesthetics, and cultural studies.
Taught in English.
Habit and Habitation: On Walter Benjamin’s Media Aesthetics and Philosophy of Technology (3 credits)
16:470:670:01
Professor Astrid Deuber-Mankowsky
Wednesdays 3:50pm - 6:50pm | AB West 4050
In recent years, Walter Benjamin has become one of the most quoted media theorists. His philosophy of technology is not as widely known as the concept of aura he developed in his essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility”. The contemporary relevance of his philosophy of technology lies in the fact that Benjamin establishes a connection between technology and different forms of habitation, and between the latter and the concept of habit (Gewohnheit), which is etymologically related to the concept of habitation (Wohnen). This enables a comparison of Benjamin’s approach with the philosophies of technology developed by Heidegger, Deleuze/Guattari, and Simondon, all of whom associate technology with the shaping of environments and the problem of poesis. In our seminar, we will reconstruct Benjamin’s media anthropology of technology through a close reading of his diaries and essays and compare it to philosophies of technology very much being discussed today.
Taught in English.
What's So Great About Goethe? (3 credits)
16:470:672:01
Professor Martha Helfer
Mondays 2:00pm - 5:00pm | AB West 4050
Close reading of Goethe’s works (selected poetry, drama, prose) against the aesthetic, cultural, historical, and political background of his time. Emphasis will be placed on developing critical reading and writing skills
Course instruction in English; readings in English translation or in the original German.
Teaching Apprenticeship in German (1.5 credits)
16:470:502:01
Professor Alexander Pichugin
By Arrangement
This course prepares graduate students for a successful teaching and learning experience in the foreign language classroom. The course addresses two major goals: introduce aspiring and beginning instructors to the most current methodologies of foreign language teaching and provide them with guidance and practical advice in the classroom. Special focus this semester will be on classroom interaction with its various aspects. The course includes designing lesson plans for a learner-centered classroom, stating objectives based on standards of foreign language learning and nationally accepted proficiency guidelines, finding authentic materials for teaching, developing and reviewing graded assignments, analyzing and comparing different assessment tools, observing and reflecting upon one's own teaching and the teaching by others, and discussing personal experiences and the challenges of the language classroom. This course is taught in German with some assignments and readings in English.