Module GERM3181: LOVE AND DEATH IN MODERN GERMAN CULTURE

Department: Modern Languages and Cultures (German)

GERM3181: LOVE AND DEATH IN MODERN GERMAN CULTURE

Pre-requisites

Corequisites

Excluded Combinations

Aims

• This modue aims to introduce students to an intersting and important existential and cultural problem still insoluble for the modernist mentality: the problem of mortality in a secular culture and the compensatory role of (mainly erotic) love in relation to that problem. Students will be introduced to major authors in philosophy and literature (Aries, Dollimore, Bronfen, Novalis, Freud, T. Mann and others). They will develop a sophisticated knowledge of the religious tradition and secular modern reflection thereon, both in general terms and in terms of the particular German traditions.
• Students will develop competence in reading and analysis of literary and theoretical discourse, also to some extent in the analysis of visual imagery.

Content

• Introduction: The Presence of Death (Totentanz, Hamlet, etc)
• Enlightenment: Euphemism (Lessing et al)
• Classicism: Vitalism and Death (Goethe, Werther, etc)
• Romanticism: Erotic Death Cult 1 (Novalis)
• Romanticism: Erotic Death Cult 2 (Werner)
• Romanticism: Sirens and Dead Women (C. Brentano)
• Poetic Realism: Male Gaze, Pygmalion, Mortification (Keller)
• Modernism 1: Death, Beauty, Ugliness (Hofmannsthal, Andrian, Schnitzler)
• Modernism 2: Death and Decadence (Nietzsche, T. Mann, Freud)
• Postmodernism: Self-reinvention, Gender, Death (Bachmann, Bernhard) (all sessions over two weeks)

Learning Outcomes

• Subject-specific knowledge: by the end of the course students will be well-informed and able critically to reflect on a major topic in modern Western and in particular German culture; they will be acquainted with a wide range of theoretical positions and texts on the subject from two centuries

• By reading texts in German students will enhance their comprehension skills in the target language; also their skills of critical literary analysis in general.

• Assessent (a commentary and a project essay) will evaluate students’ ability to assimilate, understand and analyze critically the primary and secondary material, as well as their ability to present a sustained argument with suitable evidence in German. Through participation in seminar discussion and writing essays, students will also gain skills in oral and written argumentation and presentation in the target language; and in teamwork

Modes of Teaching, Learning and Assessment and how these contribute to the learning outcomes of the module

• The course will consist of seminars structured around student presentations, and will involve two contact hours per week. These will be taught primarily in German and assessed in German.
• Preparation of presentations, a weekly programme of reading, and participation in seminars will encourage students to broaden their knowledge base and improve their skills of analysis, argumentation and presentation.

Teaching Methods and Learning Hours

Summative Assessment

Formative Assessment

None