GERST 3260 - [Oddballs, Outcasts and Rebels]

(LA-AS) Satisfies Option 1.

Fall or Spring. Next Offered: 2020-2021. 4 credits. Student option grading.

Prerequisite: one course at the 3000-3209 level in German or placement exam. Taught in German.

E. Siegel.

This course examines German history and culture from the margins. Looking at „oddballs, outcasts, and rebels” in German literature and film from the 19th to the 21st century, we will study representations and constructions of those who are excluded – because, for example, of “race,” religion, gender, sexual orientation, class – or those who choose non-conformity. Who defines what it means to be “outside”? What is, in these cases, the relationship between the individual and society? What do representations of marginal or marginalized figures tell us about the successful or failed constructions of society and identity, about family-, friendship- and gender-relations?

Authors and directors include: Gottfried Keller, Franz Kafka, Joseph Roth, Robert Walser, Ingeborg Bachmann, Max Frisch, Friedrich Dürrenmatt, Werner Herzog, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Margarethe von Trotta, Feridun Zaimoglu, Jenny Erpenbeck, Wolfgang Herrndorf. The course emphasizes the expansion of your German lexicon and the refinement of style in writing and speaking, with a particular emphasis on the ability to discuss and interpret literary and visual narratives.