German Linguistic and Cultural Studies – serie

This volume contains selected papers from an international conference of the same name held at Queen Mary, University of London, on 10-11 November 2010. The contributions from scholars working in the fields of modern political and cultural history, political science, modern European literature and linguistics provide interdisciplinary perspectives on nationalism and anti-Semitism in English- and German- language contexts from the beginning of the German Second Reich (1871) to the end of World War II (1945). Some articles examine critically theoretical constructs used to justify and defend anti-Semitism in Germany, focusing on the realms of science, music, the press and film. Others discuss the role of anti-Semitism in constructing völkisch-nationalist notions of ‘German’ identity, as well as discourses of German colonialism. As a counterpart to German perspectives, several articles chart contemporary British reactions to German anti-Semitism and radical nationalism.

The contentious relationship between modernism and totalitarianism is a key element in the architectural history of the twentieth century. Post-war historiography refused to admit any overlap between the high modernism of the 1920s and the architecture of National Socialism, as it contradicted the definition of modernism as the essential architectural expression of liberal democracy. However, National Socialist architectural history cannot be fully explored without the broader historical context of modernity. Similarly, a true understanding of modernism in architecture must acknowledge its authoritarian aspects.This book clarifies the architectural discourse in which the Greater Berlin Project of the Third Reich was produced. The association of monumentality with National Socialist architecture in the 1930s created a polarization between the classical tradition and radical modernism that provoked vigorous and acrimonious debate that lasted into the 1980s. In the attempt to reconcile the paradoxical and competing aspirations for monumentality and historicity on one hand, and for technological advance on the other, the planning of Berlin is shown to reflect the wider paradoxes of National Socialist ideology.

Translation of fiction is always interpretation. This book discusses the challenges facing translators of fictional works from German into English using as examples English translations of canonical German novellas by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Theodor Storm, Gerhart Hauptmann, Thomas Mann and Franz Kafka.The author addresses the difficulties of translating in the poststructuralist era, when every fictional work potentially has a large number of interpretations and, therefore, at least the same number of possible translations. Considering interpretations of the original text in detail not only improves the reader’s understanding and ability to criticize the translated text, but it will also provide valuable insight into the possible intentions of the writer. An initial linguistic observation of a target text can therefore lead to a fruitful connection between the linguistic and literary analysis of translated works. This book offers new perspectives on the delicate negotiation of translating source texts for a contemporary audience while maintaining the values, ideas and hidden meanings from the source in relation to its original époque.

This book informs and encourages aspiring lecturers and teaching staff in Modern Languages who prepare students for using their language skills in and out of the classroom. Drawing on pedagogical, psychological and language-specific concepts of learning, the book illustrates how such concepts can enhance students’ experience of transitioning from school to university to residence abroad, and beyond.A key feature of the study is an investigation of students’ fragility as they transition from school to university and, only two years later, from their home institution to their placements abroad. Interventions intended to «teach» transition are shown to be unsuccessful, as the learning through such interventions tends to remain superficial. First-year students are shown to benefit from trust-building between students and teachers and early networking among their peers to build self-confidence. In contrast, prior to studying abroad students benefit more from intercultural awareness training, including linguistic, cultural, social, academic and/or emotional aspects.The book serves as a useful basis for discussion in Modern Languages departments about curriculum change and university policy with regard to resourcing the Humanities.

This study traces how Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), founder of Anthroposophy and the Waldorf schools, and the sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920) confronted the societal transformations in fin-de-siècle Germany as their primary identity marker – Bildung or self-formation – began to break down. The book documents the German bourgeoisie’s failure to modernise as an «imagined community», shedding new light on the larger question about the interrelationship of science, religion and culture by situating Weber’s and Steiner’s work into the broader context of the sociocultural and sociopolitical transformations during which it was created. Moreover, by exploring the influences across disciplines in a historical context the book provides insight into the cultural implications of new social science and religion at the beginning of the twentieth century.

How did German visual artists relate to the broader society around them between the invention of the artist as «genius» and visionary, in the Romantic era of the nineteenth century, and the struggle to overcome pauperization and social marginalization through collective professionalization during much of the twentieth? The collective – if not always agreed – aspirations and expectations of artists in this long period are best reflected in the schools and academies that came to dominate their education, in their professional associations, and their strategies of marketing and economic well-being. Like members of other German learned professions, visual artists struggled to achieve autonomy from state, church, and other powerful social and economic forces while also raising and maintaining ever-evolving professional standards. Like other professions, they were forced also to make compromises with power and money, losing many battles in the process. The subjectivity of values surrounding art, the de facto economic status of artists as small entrepreneurs unable or unwilling to submit fully to corporate, bureaucratic, or union organization, and the practical inability to limit their numbers all conspired to undermine fully successful professionalization. By bringing the tools of social history to bear, this book sheds rare illumination on the little-known history of the many «everyday» German artists, rather than on the better-known works of the few.

This book provides a detailed analysis of the lyrics of the German rock musician Udo Lindenberg and of the singer-songwriter Konstantin Wecker. The investigation starts from the assumption that lyrics which are not in English put more weight onto the textual side of popular songs; the lyrics are therefore analysed separately from music and performance. Furthermore, this study goes beyond the distinction between dominant and mass literature which, within literary studies, has so far prevented an unbiased approach towards song lyrics. Finally, it is suggested that Lindenberg’s and Wecker’s lyrics can be read as contemporary variations of «Gebrauchslyrik», a concept that was developed by major representatives of the German cabaret culture during the 1920s and 1930s. Hence, the book recapitulates the history of both the German cabaret and the development of German popular music, and places Lindenberg and Wecker within these cultural movements.

From the late seventeenth century into the eighteenth, critics and authors in Germany defended the novel: indeed it depicted vice and immorality, but only with the intention of exhorting the reader to avoid such dangers to the soul. This book examines outstanding novels of life from the Thirty Years’ War to the Vormärz, mostly written with this real or apparent moral aim, and evaluates them as documents of social history. The author finds that concepts of truth and plausibility are different in the early modern period. Initial and closing chapters deal with French novels, showing how approaches to society differ across national cultures.

This volume, composed mainly of papers given at the 1999 conferences of the Forum for German Language Studies (FGLS) at Kent and the Conference of University Teachers of German (CUTG) at Keele, is devoted to differential yet synergetic treatments of the German language. It includes corpus-lexicographical, computational, rigorously phonological, historical/dialectal, comparative, semiotic, acquisitional and pedagogical contributions. In all, a variety of approaches from the rigorously ‘pure’ and formal to the applied, often feeding off each other to focus on various aspects of the German language.

Arising from a colloquium held in Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick, in March 2004, this volume offers fresh insights into Swiss culture and literature from an Irish perspective. It brings together articles by writers and scholars from various academic fields including cultural studies, linguistics and literature. The book is a reflection of the multifaceted interests of Irish academics in Switzerland as a cultural space in the heart of Europe. Ireland as a vantage point, situated at the western margin of the European continent, offers new perspectives from which differences as well as surprising parallels between the two cultures become visible and from which Switzerland appears in a different light. The volume critically addresses questions of identity in Swiss literature and culture and discusses them from various angles – by analysing the representation of minority cultures in Swiss literary and media discourse, by reading Swiss literature in an intercultural context, but also through accounts of Irish visitors in Switzerland and Swiss writers travelling to or living in Ireland.

This book explores the interplay between global and local influences in theatre festivals in the German-speaking border region around Lake Constance. Whilst opening up a fascinating yet under-researched theatre region to academic study, it also provides much-needed empirical grounding for often vague theories of place, globalisation and culture. Do we really live in a ‘shrinking world’ dominated by a homogenising global culture industry, or are we experiencing the revival of ‘local particularism’? To what extent is an apparently place-dependent cultural form such as theatre affected by the processes of cultural globalisation? Through detailed analysis of theatrical case studies from Lake Constance and the application of an interdisciplinary theoretical framework, this book begins to answer such important questions. The empirical focus is on the defining features of the Lake Constance region: the beautiful and often romanticised natural landscape of lake and mountains, and the presence of the nation-state borders which make this the crossroads of the German-speaking world. The author thus examines both open-air summer theatre festivals, such as the internationally renowned Bregenzer Festspiele, and politically focused cross-border theatre festivals, such as the youth festival TRIANGEL.

This book contains the proceedings of a symposium that took place in Melbourne in September 2006. Its focus is on theatre at the intersection of culture and politics during and after German reunification and the evolution of the Berlin Republic. The book considers how canonical and new theatrical works, including those performed at the renowned former East German theatres – the Deutsches Theater, the Volksbühne and the Berliner Ensemble – resonated with reunification. Topics include the dynamics of theatrical performance, the emergent performative identities, the new alliances between theatre and the world, the re-engagement with history and the shifting perspectives of nationalism, transnationalisation and globalisation. These matters acquire renewed focus with the approach of the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the wall in 2009. The book is the first to offer English-speaking readers a collection of essays on the key theatrical productions of this dynamic period of cultural and political change. Underlying the collection is a reaffirmation of the continuing relevance of theatre to events in the public sphere.