GERST 4100 - Senior Seminar

(LA-AS) Satisfies Option 1.

Fall. 4 credits.

Prerequisite: any German course at the 3000-level or equivalent or permission of instructor. Taught in German.

P. Gilgen.

The Senior Seminar is a requirement of the German Studies major but is open to all students who have met the prerequisites. The course has a research component and is taught each fall by a faculty member in the Department of German Studies on a topic of their expertise.

Topic: “Ingeborg Bachmann: Philosophy, Poetry, Prose”. The course is intended as a research seminar examining the entirety of Ingeborg Bachmann’s writings (we will read all the prose, some of her philosophical work, most of her short fiction and at least one of the novels/novel fragments contained in the Todesarten project). Bachmann was one of the foremost figures in post-WW II German letters; she made her name as a lyric poet, but later all but abandoned the genre to begin a monumental prose project that was never finished in its intended form but has been much discussed especially among feminist scholars and theorists. We will also spend some time exploring the philosophical beginnings of Bachmann’s career (her dissertation on Heidegger and her writings on Wittgenstein).