HISTORY OF GERMAN CULTURE MOD. 2

The course of History of German Culture (1 and 2) belongs to the curriculum German Literature of the Master's Degree Programme European, American and Postcolonial Language and Literature. According to the aims of the Master's Degree and to the areas Literatures and Cultures, the course provides the ability to consolidate advanced critical and methodological instruments and a solid knowledge of literary texts and debates in their cultural and historical context.

Aims of this course are 1) the ability to analyse critically some of the most significant thoretical and literary texts of the cultural debates about "Kulturkritik" in the German-speaking countries from the French Revolution until the Fall of Berlin Wall; 2) the comprehension of these debates in their cultural and historical context; 3) the ability to consolidate critical and methodological instruments; 4) the ability to comprehend and analyze texts and contexts in a competent and autonomous way; 5) the ability to perfectionate comunication and production in the original language by an accurate reading of the texts, the discussion and presentation in class and and a detailed study of scientific writing in German; 6) the ability to write a well-discussed and formally correct scientific paper in German; 7) the ability to discuss with international lecturers in seminars and workshops about the subjects of the course.

Degree in Modern languages according to the rules of the course LLEAP.
Other students and Erasmus students are kindly asked to contact the lecturer.

Civilisation and its Discontent. The phenomenon of "Kulturkritik" in German Culture from the French Revolution until the Fall of the Berlin Wall (1789-1989):

In the twilight of the Age of Enlightenment, particularly after the French Revolution and the Terror, many German-speaking writers and intellectuals expressed themselves strongly critical towards reason, which was no longer seen as a source of knowledge and emancipation but interpreted as an instrument of power and violence within the mechanisms of bourgeois society. In the course of the last two centuries, such critical thinking, with which modern culture has expressed its unease by reflecting above all on itself and its own limitations, has emerged cyclically in the writings of authors, even very different from each other, such as Friedrich Schiller, Novalis, Thomas Mann, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Sigmund Freud and Botho Strauss. 'Kulturkritik', 'anti-modernism', 'aesthetic fundamentalism' are just some of the terms subsequently used by critics to define such intellectual positions.
The course intends to dwell on some of the programmatic texts of the aforementioned authors and to investigate the different literary styles and genres, also very mixed and experimental, with which cultural criticism and anti-modernism are expressed in their work (from the essay to the theatre, from the 'intellectual novel' to the letter and newspaper article).
The reflection will be chronologically divided into three moments:
1. Kulturkritik and the French Revolution: Schiller and Novalis;
2. Kulturkritik and Nationalism (before, during and between the World Wars), with a focus on the authors of the (Wiener) Moderne: Freud, Hofmannsthal, Mann;
3. Kulturkritik and national identity in contemporary times (fall of the Berlin Wall, migration): Botho Strauß.
The course intends to investigate both the potential of these critical positions for modern culture, as well as their heterogeneous ideological developments and their outcomes, which have not infrequently proved to be problematic.

1.
Friedrich Schiller: Über die ästhetische Erziehung des Menschen, in einer Reihe von Briefen (ed. Reclam or online text:
http://www.zeno.org/Literatur/M/Schiller,+Friedrich/Theoretische+Schriften/%C3%9Cber+die+%C3%A4sthetische+Erziehung+des+Menschen+in+einer+Reihe+von+Briefen );
Novalis: Fragmente und Studien, Die Christenheit oder Europa, Reclam, Stuttgart 1986, pp. 67-89 (or online text:
http://www.zeno.org/Literatur/M/Novalis/Essay/Die+Christenheit+oder+Europa );
Thomas Mann: Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen, Fischer, Frankfurt a.M. 2001 (capitolo „Bürgerlichkeit“, pp. 120-165);
Hugo von Hofmannsthal: Das Schrifttum als geistiger Raum der Nation, in: Hofmannsthal, Hugo von: Reden und Aufsätze, in: ders.: Gesammelte Werke in zehn Einzelbänden, a cura di Bernd Schoeller con la collaborazione di Rudolf Hirsch, Frankfurt a.M. 1979, vol. 3, pp. 24-41 oppure testo online: http://ds.ub.uni-bielefeld.de/viewer/image/97830/1/ );
Sigmund Freud: Das Unbehagen in der Kultur, in: Studienausgabe IX , Fischer, Frankfurt a. M. 1970,(or Reclam edition);
Thomas Mann: Deutschland und die Deutschen, in: Essays (vol. 5: Deutschland und die Deutschen 1938-1945), a cura di Hermann Kurzke e Stephan Stachorski, Frankfurt a.M. 1996, pp. 260-281;
Arthur Schnitzler: Das Wort/Professor Bernhardi/Fink und Fliederbusch, in: Gesammelte Werke. Die dramatischen Werke, Bd. 2, Frankfurt a.M. 1981;
Botho Strauss: Anschwellender Bocksgesang (8.2.1993, online: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-13681004.html );
Botho Strauss: Der letzte Deutsche (2.10.2015, online: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/index-2015-41.html ).
2.
Olivier Agard/Barbara Beßlich (Hrsg.): Kulturkritik zwischen Deutschland und Frankreich (1890–1933) in SCHRIFTEN ZUR POLITISCHEN KULTUR DER WEIMARER REPUBLIK, Peter Lang,Frankfurt a.M. 2016, vol. 18 (pp. 9-21; 291-305);
Barbara Beßlich: Wege in den „Kulturkrieg“. Zivilisationskritik in Deutschland 1890-1914, Darmstadt 2000, (pp. 1-44);
Stefan Breuer: Ästhetischer Fundamentalismus. Stefan George und der deutsche Antimodernismus, Darmstadt 1996 (Einleitung, pp.1-10; Präludium, pp. 11-19; Drittes Kapitel: Die Kultur und ihre Feinde, pp. 184-240, Die Paradoxie des ästhetischen Fundamentalismus, pp. 241-244);
Barbara Beßlich/Cristina Fossaluzza: Kulturkritik der Wiener Moderne (1890-1938), Winter, Heidelberg 2019 (p. 2-21).
Georg Bollenbeck: Eine Geschichte der Kulturkritik. Von Rousseau bis Günther Anders, Beck, München 2007.

An oral exam divided into different parts:

Module 1:
- a translation of a text passage from German into Italian;
- a general check about the whole programme;
- a brief presentation of a paper written in German (5-10 pages).

Module 2:
- a translation of a text passage from German into Italian;
- a general check about the whole programme;
- a brief presentation of a paper written in German (10-15 pages).

Lectures, seminar discussions, lectures in collaboration with international lecturers.

Teaching activities include two lectures in collaboration with two lecturers from Bielefeld University as part of the Erasmus exchange with the same university (15.11.2023: Dr. Jan Andres on the topic: B. Strauß' Anschwellender Bocksgesang and 6.12.2023: Dr. Lutz Graner on the topic: Verlagslandschaft / Literaturbetrieb in Deutschland).

written and oral

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "International cooperation" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development