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Programs in German

• Major in German: Choose from a wide variety of courses in language, business German language, culture, literature, and history. You can be confident that you will leave our program fluent in the language and at ease in the cultures and traditions of the German speaking countries
• Major in German Studies: This versatile program offers you fluency in the language, culture, and literature, in addition to enabling you to select five courses related to your German interests in other School of Arts and Science departments. An efficient way to double major and to prepare for graduate school or an international career.
• Double Major in German and Your Major of Choice: You are already in the Wharton School, International Relations, Computer Science, History, or Political Science. If you want to make yourself really competitive, then consider adding German as a double major. This could be just the edge you need.
• Minor in German: You have satisfied your language requirement, but elect to keep up your German with some advanced language courses. To obtain a minor only requires 6 credits beyond GRMN 104 and most of your courses satisfy other college requirements.
• Certificate in German Language Study: Students can receive a Certificate by completing 3 courses taught in German in addition to passing proficiency. Students must receive a minimum of a B+ average in the three courses, and may not take the courses on a pass/fail basis.
• Study abroad programs in Germany: The above mentioned options can readily be combined with Penn’s study abroad programs in Berlin, Frankfurt, and Munich. Do not forget these programs afford you Penn credit for the courses that you take. You will satisfy courses in your major, double major or minor as you become more fluent in the Germanic language via total immersion in one of three of Europe’s most exciting cities.
• European Studies Minor: European Studies at Penn is an interdisciplinary minor and an ideal addition to the study of many disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. It supplements majors in history, political science, sociology, and art history as well as in French, German, English, Spanish, Italian and Slavic languages. It is designed to give students access to
  • an understanding of Europe as a historical and cultural entity and its world leadership in business, politics, and culture; a great variety of countries, cultures, and languages whose interaction with each other and the United States is an essential part of transatlantic culture; the institutions of a new Europe -- Union, Council on Europe, European Court -- reflecting the largest experiment in building a global system of governance in history. The minor in European Studies is designed to intensify interdisciplinary studies by integrating the humanities and social sciences and prepare students to live and work in Europe .
  • For more information, please visit: http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/europeanstudies/
    

Freshman Seminars

GRMN 001 (FILM 050) Looking for Lola: The Allure of a Cinematic Name
401 MW 2 - 3:30 pm S. Richter
We all know about Eve and Mary, two names that readily designate opposite relations to masculinity and sexuality. But what about Lola? Beginning in the early twentieth century, the name of Lola has gripped the imagination of directors and screenwriters and launched a cinematic tradition. The name is certainly based on Lola Montez, a nineteenth-century British woman of humble origins who used her sexuality and prevaricating charm to rise to worldwide renown as an erotic dancer and the lover of composers (Lizst) and kings (Ludwig of Bavaria), leaving disaster in her wake. Ever since Marlene Dietrich’s seductive role as Lola Lola, the risqué nightclub entertainer in Joseph Sternberg’s scandalous Blue Angel (1930), the name Lola has specified the realm of the quintessential vamp. In this course we will explore the cinematic femininity, sexuality and gender associated with the name Lola (and its close cousins Lulu and Lolita). We will encounter Lolas of ambiguous, precocious, calculating, and irresistible sexuality: a Turkish-German transvestite, a sexual nymph, a schemer during Germany ’s economic miracle, and a man-killer eventually slain by Jack the Ripper. What is remarkable about the films associated with Lola is that each discovers her anew and contributes to a complex nexus of issues involving sexuality, pleasure, knowledge, and power, far more interesting, in the final analysis, than the alternatives of Mary and Eve.

GRMN 008 Superstition & Erudition: Daily Life in the Middle Ages
Distribution II: May be counted as a Distributional course in History & Tradition. All readings and lectures in English. No knowledge of German is required.
301 MWF 11 am - 12 pm F. Brevart
This freshman seminar focuses on daily life in the Middle Ages, including chronology and astrology, food, the university, travel, and medicine and pharmacy.

GRMN 009 Double Trouble
Fulfills the College Writing Requirement
301 MW 3:30 - 5 pm V. Byrd
The doppelgänger or double motif abounds in nineteenth and twentieth century Gothic literature and film. These works can thrill, horrify, and entertain, as well as stimulate critical reflection by their viewers and readers. In this course we will write about how these psychological, suspenseful, and sexual aspects of character doubling offer a wide variety of interpretations and critical readings, including investigations of identity, technology, voyeurism, desire, and relationships with others. We will read and view works by representative authors and directors, including E.T.A. Hoffmann, Kleist, Storm, Poe, Dostoyevsky, Freud, Hitchcock, Bergman, and Lynch. Course requirements will include active and meaningful participation and peer review, as well as journal and essay writing. Students will submit a portfolio of their written work at the end of the semester. All texts will be read in translation.

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Language Courses

GRMN 101 (GRMN 501) Elementary German I
001 MTWRF 11 am - 12 pm E. Shrader Hauze
002 MTWRF 12 - 1 pm K. Wallach
003 MTWRF 3 - 4 pm K. Machtans
Designed for the beginning student with no previous knowledge of German. German 101, as the first course in the first-year series, focuses on the development of language competencies in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. By the end of the semester students will be able to engage in simple conversations about familiar things, know greetings and everyday expressions, they will be able to count and tell time, and negate sentences in day-to-day contexts. Furthermore, students will be able to speak about events that happened in the immediate past and express plans for the future. In addition, students will have developed reading strategies that allow them to glean information from simple newspaper and magazine articles and short literary texts. Because cultural knowledge is one of the foci of German 101, students will learn much about practical life in Germany and will explore German-speaking cultures on the Internet.

GRMN 102 (GRMN 502) Elementary German II
001 MTWRF 11 am - 12 pm C. Lynn
002 MTWRF 12 - 1 pm C. Lynn
This course is a continuation of GRMN 101 and is designed to strengthen and expand students’ listening, speaking, reading, and writing competencies and to deepen an understanding of German-speaking cultures. By the end of the course students will be able to handle a variety of day-to-day needs in a German-speaking setting and engage in simple conversations about personally significant topics. Students can expect to be able to order food and beverages, purchase things, and to be familiar with the German university system, the Arts, media, and current social topics. Students will begin to be able to talk about the past and the future, make comparisons, describe people and things in increasing detail, make travel plans that include other European countries, and make reservations in hotels and youth hostels. By the end of the course students will be able to talk about their studies and about their dreams for the future. In addition, students will develop reading strategies that should allow them to understand the general meaning of articles, and short literary texts. Furthermore, students will feel more able to understand information when hearing German speakers talking about familiar topics. Cultural knowledge remains among one of the foci of German 102, and students will continue to be exposed to authentic materials.

GRMN 103 (GRMN 503) Intermediate German I
001 MTRF 11 am - 12 pm M. Belcher
002 MTRF 12 - 1 pm M. Taylor
003 MWTF 3 - 4 pm S. Schlichting-Artur
Improves students’ writing and speaking competencies in German, increases vocabulary, and helps to develop effective reading and listening strategies. Our in-class discussions are based on weekly readings of literary and non-literary texts to facilitate exchange of information, ideas, reactions, and opinions. In addition, the readings provide cultural and historical background information. The review of grammar will not be the primary focus of the course. Students will, however, expand and deepen their knowledge of grammar through specific grammar exercises. The course also offers a film component and concludes with a glossed excerpt from a longer text in preparation for German 104.


GRMN 104 (GRMN 504) Intermediate German II
001 MTRF 11 am - 12 pm D. James
002 MTRF 12 - 1 pm Staff
Expands students’ writing and speaking competencies in German, increases vocabulary, and helps students practice effective reading and listening strategies. Our in-class discussions are based on weekly readings of literary and non-literary texts to facilitate exchange of information, ideas, reactions, and opinions. In addition, the readings provide cultural and historical background information. The review of grammar will not be the primary focus of the course. Students will, however, expand and deepen their knowledge of grammar through specific grammar exercises. Students will conclude the basic-language program at PENN by reading an abridged and glossed version of an authentic literary text offering the opportunity to practice and deepen reading knowledge and to sensitize cultural and historical awareness of German-speaking countries.

GRMN 106 Accelerated Elementary German
001 MWF 10 - 11 am, TR 10:30 am - 12 pm C. Schnader
An intensive two credit course in which two semesters of elementary German (GRMN 101 & 102) are completed in one.  Introduction to the basic elements of spoken and written German, with emphasis placed on the acquisition of communication skills.  Readings and discussions focus on cultural differences. Expression and comprehension are then expanded through the study of literature and social themes .

GRMN 180 German in Residence
301 TBA M. Belcher
This is a 1/2 credit course for students living in the Modern Language House.

GRMN 215 Conversation and Composition
Prerequisite(s): GRMN 104 or the equivalent. Required for the major, also carries credit for the minor in German.
001 MWF 12 - 1 pm C. Frei
002 MWF 11 am - 12 pm Staff
Offers students the opportunity to improve significantly written and spoken discourse strategies and to raise language competence to an academic register. In addition, the course familiarizes students with several reading strategies. Students write several essays, weekly reaction pieces, lead discussions, and create short in-class presentations. During the second half of the semester, students create a common course web site in connection with their readings of an authentic literary text. In collaborative group work, students create the contents for different components: biography, text analyses, historical background, geography and didactizations emphasizing integrated skills and discourse competence. Their work is posted to a web site, which in turn, is incorporated in the 4 th-semester syllabus, where students use the peer-generated information and comprehension checks for their understanding of an abridged version of the authentic literary text.

Please visit the Homo.Cyber project at http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/german/215/

 Business German

GRMN 219 German Business World
Distribution I: Society
Foreign Languages Across Curriculum (FLAC)
Prerequisite(s): GRMN 215 or equivalent. No previous knowledge of economics or business required. Course taught in German.
001 MWF 1 - 2 pm D. James
This course is designed to introduce students to the basic concepts of the German business world: economic geography, the European Union, transportation, tourism, elements of business correspondence, and forms of adequate comportment and manners while in Germany. Emphasis on correct usage of appropriate business vocabulary and German grammar.

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Courses Taught in English

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Literature and Culture

GRMN 269 Introduction to German Culture
Distribution III: Arts & Letters
Foreign Languages Across Curriculum (FLAC)
Prerequisite(s): GRMN 104 or equivalent
001 TR 12 - 1:30 pm B. Wiggin
I In this course, we examine and explore over a thousand years of cultural history of the German-speaking lands with an eye toward clarifying the key cultural knowledge shared by German speakers. From the Germanic tribes to the Holy Roman Empire and into the twentieth century, we examine what makes the German nations -- and peoples -- what they are today. We will pay attention both to mainstream tendencies as well as oppositional political and cultural movements. A special emphasis will be placed on cultural achievements such as literature, music, and architecture as well as on a basic understanding of the politics, economics and cultural formations of Switzerland , Austria and Germany in the 20th and 21st centuries. Speaking knowledge of German is required, but the course will include exercises for improving language skills and learning to discuss difficult cultural concepts in the target language, German.

GRMN 375 Contemporary German Literature
Distribution III: Arts & Letters
301 MW 2 - 3:30 pm H. Daemmrich
The course explores the wide range and diversity of contemporary German literature. Lectures and discussions will focus on the most important thematic patterns, prominent stylistic features, the search for orientation before and after reunification, changing attitudes toward recent German history, and diverse trends in the critical assessment of social phenomena today.
Readings include texts from German, Austrian, and Swiss authors.

GRMN 378 Foreign in Germany
Distribution I: Society.
Prerequisite(s): GRMN 215 or equivalent.
001 TR 10:30 am - 12 pm S. Shields
Foreign minority groups are integral elements of German society. This course will provide an overview of the history of foreigners in Germany and their political, social and economic significance. Content-rich reading materials will show Germany as a country that is rapidly developing into a multinational, multiracial and multicultural society. Focusing on the various attitudes of Germans held towards foreigners and the foreigners' attitudes towards life in Germany , the text selection will provide the basis for in-depth study of the subject, including the development of German policy regarding foreigners.

GRMN 399 Independent Study
000 See department for section numbers Staff

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Graduate Seminars

GRMN 516 Teaching Methods
301 WR 9 - 10:30 am C. Frei
This course examines major foreign language methodologies, introduces resources available to foreign language teachers, and addresses current issues and concerns of foreign language teaching and learning, such as second language acquisition theory and application of technology.

GRMN 531 German Literature to the 18th Century
301 TR 10:30 am - 12 pm B. Wiggin
This seminar explores key chapters in the history of German literature since the beginnings. Our discussion of canonical works and authors ranging from the early medieval period to the early Enlightenment is intended to provide a firm grounding in German literary history. It is a discussion framed by questions to which we will constantly return: What is “die Literatur” anyway? What is “German” literature? How has its history been written? Which literary histories and other handbooks are essential to the work of “Germanisten”? How does literary history differ from cultural history? Can methods from new cultural histories help us in our investigations of literary history? Assignments differ for undergraduate and graduate students; they include several short papers and oral presentations as well as a final project.

GRMN 534 (COML 501/ENGL 571/FREN 512) History of Literary Theory
401 T 12 - 3 pm J. English


GRMN 554 (RELS 500) Theories of Religion
401 W 3 - 6 pm S. Dunning
A study of the various ways of interpreting religion as a phenomenon in human life. Analysis of the presuppositions involved in psychological, sociological, and phenomenological approaches. Authors include James, Weber, Freud, Otto, Eliade, and contemporary writers.

GRMN 602 (LING 610) Seminar in Germanic Philologies - Comparative Germanic Philology
401 T 9 - 11 am A. Speyer
The aim of this course is to compare the oldest attested Germanic languages with respect to mainly their Phonology, Morphology, Syntax. Typical phenomena common to Germanic in general (e.g. Grimm’s Law, weak conjugation) and points of divergence between the respective branches (e.g. Verb-second in N- and W-Germanic) are analysed and put into a larger Indoeuropean context. The focus of this course will be on Gothic (as oldest attested Germanic language and representative of the East Germanic branch), Old Icelandic (as representative of the North Germanic languages), Old English and Old High German (as the two opposite poles of the West Germanic dialect continuum). If time permits, we will read at the end of the course portions of the Gothic Gospel translation (Wulfila).

 

GRMN 660 Literature After 1945: Recording, Remembrance, and Forgetting
301 W 4:30 - 6:30 pm
The seminar examines literary and other artistic works that represent contested parts of the recent German past. Particular attention will be paid to the use made of historical facts in lyric poetry, prose, documentary theater, film, and photography. Through close readings of emblematic literary and theoretical texts, we will consider the widespread notion of the past as a narrative construction, investigate modes of witnessing and testimony, and examine collective and individual repression as well as private and public rituals of remembrance. The material will be considered along with the larger claim of literary discourse, and lyric poetry specifically, as uniquely suited to represent otherwise inaccessible dimensions of experience.

GRMN 663 Weimar Literature
301 R 2 - 4 pm N. Isenberg
This course examines the major cultural developments—including Expressionism, New Objectivity, and the European avant-garde—that took place during the tumultuous years of Germany’s first experiment in democracy. We will cover a variety of genres (poetry, drama, fiction and non-fiction), while also paying attention to the visual arts, in particular the cinema. The primary aims of the course are: to familiarize students with the rich cultural efflorescence of the period; to examine the legacy of the First World War, the rise of the urban metropolis and their various representations; and to assess the course of history as reflected both in and outside the literary sphere. Authors to be covered include: Vicki Baum, Walter Benjamin, Bertolt Brecht, Alfred Döblin, Ernst Jünger, Irmgard Keun, Siegfried Kracauer, Erich Maria Remarque, Joseph Roth and Ernst Toller. (Conducted as a research seminar, requiring an oral presentation and lengthy scholarly paper, primary readings and discussion will be in German.)

GRMN 664 (HIST 620/HSSC 620/JWST 620/RELS 622) Topics in European History - A History of Cultural History: The Renaissance
301 T 4 - 7 pm A. Moyer
Cultural History: a set of research methods? questions? topics? interpretive assumptions? metanarratives?
In this course, we will address these questions through a historical approach. We will examine some of the major writings of the early cultural historians of the nineteenth centure, chart the broad expansion of cultural history in the twentieth, and discuss some of the implications for doing history in the century that lies before us. In doing so, we will devote particular attention to the central importance of the era of the European Renaissance-or later medieval and early modern European history-in the development of cultural history. In that process we will survey a range of the interdisciplinary themes, issues, and methods that have come to be known as cultural history.

GRMN 674 (ENGL 592/FILM 591) Topics Aesthetic Theory - The Essay Film
401 T 9 am - 12 pm T. Corrigan
At least through much of the nineteenth century, the essay was perceived by many as a secondary, less creative genre of writing, suspected for its incidental, public, and parasitic nature. Others, such as Walter Pater, T. W. Adorno, and Roland Barthes, have been considerably more appreciative, often, like Pater, seeing the essay as the "strictly appropriate form of our modern philosophical literature." The first part of this seminar will examine the different possibilities and debates that have described this particular form of writing from its sixteenth-century beginnings in the works of Montaigne (when, in Foucault's words, "commentary yields to criticism") through twentieth-century theories and practices of the essay from Lukacs and Adorno through Umberto Eco, Roland Barthes, and Christa Wolf. The majority of the course, however, will concentrate on the reincarnation of this literary form as the essay film, and in this context we will investigate the work of Chris Marker, Jean-Luc Godard, Trinh T. Minh-ha, Erroll Morris, Derek Jarman and others. Rather than assuming experience with film scholarship and film history, we will use this course as at least a partial introduction to both. Students will be encouraged to develop their own positions and arguments (most notably in a final research project). My own emphasis, however, will be on 1) the historical and cultural conditions that encouraged essayistic writing, 2) the formal and expressive possibilities made exclusively available by the essay, and 3) the larger issues raised by the essay about the relation of writing to creativity or originality, to the politics and industry of a public domain, and to aesthetic categories such as romanticism, modernism, and postmodernism. Besides the primary research project, students will submit one shorter essay and, at some point in the semester, lead the seminar in a short discussion of their project.

GRMN 678 Realism: Literature and Theory - canceled
301 W 3 - 5 pm L. Weissberg
What is "realism"? What does it mean to depict the world as a "realist" writer or artist? This seminar will consider these questions and concentrate on German literature and art of the second half of the nineteenth century. It will focus on writers such as Stifter, Storm, Raabe, and Fontane; but also on Stifter's drawings and paintings, visual artists such as Menzel, and the vogue of historical painting. Finally, the seminar will consider the role of early photography in the development of the notion of "realism." Secondary literature will include studies by Michael Fried, Linda Nochlin, and others.

GRMN 990 Masters Thesis
000 see department for section numbers Staff

GRMN 995 Dissertation
000 see department for section numbers Staff

GRMN 999 Independent Study
000 see department for section numbers Staff

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CGS Courses

GRMN 101 (GRMN 501) Elementary German I
601 MW 6:30-8:45  Staff
Introduction to the basic elements of spoken and written German, with emphasis placed on the acquisition of communication skills. Readings and discussion focus on cultural differences.

GRMN 103 (GRMN 503) Intermediate German I
601 MW 6:30-8:15 Staff
Modern German texts of moderate difficulty and an integrated grammar review advance the student's command of the language.

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Yiddish Courses

GRMN 401 (JWST 031) Beginning Yiddish I
Two Years Fulfills the Language Requirement.
401 TR 12 - 1:30 pm K. Hellerstein
Yiddish, a 1000-year-old language, with a rich heritage. Learn the basic skills of reading, writing, and speaking Yiddish. Discover the treasures of Yiddish culture: songs, literature, folklore, and films.

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Dutch Courses & Studies

DTCH 101 Elementary Dutch I - canceled
4 01 MWF 12-1 R. Naborn
A first semester language course covering the core Dutch grammar and vocabulary with the goal of providing the corner stone for developing overall linguistic proficiency in Dutch.

DTCH 103 (DTCH 503) Intermediate Dutch I
401 TR 4:30 - 6 pm R. Naborn
A third semester Dutch language course. The emphasis lies on vocabulary expansion through the use of audio-taped materials and readings. Grammar is expanded beyond the basics and focuses on compound sentences, features of text coherence and idiomatic language usage.

DTCH 232 (ARTH 301) Interpreting Early Landscapes
401 W 2 - 5 pm L. Silver
Benjamin Franklin Seminar. Distribution III: May be counted as a Distributional course in Arts & Letters. Taught in English.
The relationship between man and nature has always marked the boundaries of civilization, but in the visual arts landscape has only formed a serious subject since the end of the Middle Ages, with the new-found ability of artists to create plausible realities. This course will explore the varieties of depicted landscapes, including maps and city views in early atlases within the shifting purposes of art over the past five centuries of paintings and prints. One featured element of the course experience will be a major exhibition of landscapes by the Dutch painter, Jacob van Ruisdael (1628-1682) at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Class visits to the Museum for that event as well as for the permanent collection will provide first-hand contact with paintings from the Renaissance era to the Impressionists.

DTCH 399 Independent Study
000 see department for section numbers R. Naborn

DTCH 503 (DTCH 103) Intermediate Dutch I
401 TR 4:30 - 6 pm R. Naborn
A third semester Dutch language course. The emphasis lies on vocabulary expansion through the use of audio-taped materials and readings. Grammar is expanded beyond the basics and focuses on compound sentences, features of text coherence and idiomatic language usage.

DTCH 601 (ARTH 762) Rubens, Rembrandt & Religion
401 T 5 - 7 pm L. Silver
Graduate Seminar in Renaissance Art. Taught in English.

DTCH 999 Independent Study
000 see department for section numbers R. Naborn

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Swedish Courses

SCND 101 (SCND 501) Elementary Swedish I
401 MWF 11 am - 12 pm K. Williams
Basic language course stressing grammatical structures and vocabulary, pronunciation, simple conversation and reading of elementary texts. Credit for this course will only be given upon successful completion of SCND 102.


SCND 399 Independent Study
000 TBA K. Williams

SCND 501 (SCND 101) Elementary I
401 MWF 11 am - 12 pm K. Williams
Basic language course stressing grammatical structures and vocabulary, pronunciation, simple conversation and reading of elementary texts. Credit for this course will only be given upon successful completion of SCND 502.