1107-1 Lecture: Trans-Atlantic Intertextualities in Anglo-American Fiction
Wednesday, 1-3 pm, HSG HS 5
J. Ronthaler & E. Schenkel (Institut für Anglistik)
The lecture this time will concentrate on selected literary influences that criss-cross the Atlantic Ocean between the two countries. Starting with a historical survey and following historical developments Elmar Schenkel and Jürgen Ronthaler will alternate in a loose sequence in reflecting about various representative phenomena that shaped both literatures and cultures. We will discuss W. Irving, Trancendentalism and E.A. Poe, will consider Ch. Dickens, A. Trollope, H. James, Sir A.C. Doyle and E. Hemingway, and we will deal with Mark Twain as a Traveller and as an author of children’s and adolescent fiction. Furthermore detective fiction, poetry and science in Anglo-American fiction will be investigated.
A list with the programme will be available at the beginning of the term.
1107-2a [English] Into the Wilderness: Contemporary Canadian Literature
Monday, 9-11 am, NSG 322
S. Welz (Institut für Anglistik)
Literatur:
Margaret Atwood: Cat’s Eye (1988); Rudy Wiebe: A Discovery of Strangers (1994); Yann Martel: Life of Pi (2002); Alice Munro: Selected Short Stories
Begleitende Literatur: The Cambridge Companion to Canadian Literature. Cambridge University Press, 2004.
Die angegebenen Romane sind in den einschlägigen Buchhandlungen (Connewitzer Verlagsbuchhandlung und Universitätsbuchhandlung) käuflich zu erwerben; die Short Stories werden als Kopiervorlage / elektronischer Text zur Verfügung gestellt.
Prüfung: Hausarbeit
Canadian Literature is still a comparatively young cultural phenomenon. Only a few decades ago in her critical study Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (1972) Canadian writer Margaret Atwood fused the conception of Canadian literature with notions of national identity. Today, the question of identity still seems to be on the agenda while we are witnessing an ever-growing, stylistically diverse, and thematically rich literary output from this vast country. The course provides a first approach to Canadian literature in English via a selection of recent prose texts in focusing on the thematic aspect of ‘Wilderness’. Textual analyses of this central conception will emphasize conflicts such as man vs. nature, the urban vs. the rural, mass society vs. individual isolation.
1107-2b [English] A Special Relationship?
Wednesday, 9-11 am, NSG 222
F. Hofmeister (Institut für Anglistik)
Empfohlene Vorbereitung:
Ein Überblickswissen über die Geschichte Großbritanniens und der USA seit Beginn der Neuzeit wird vorausgesetzt.
Literatur:
A reader with a detailed bibliography and essential texts will be made available at the beginning of the term.
Prüfung: Hausarbeit
The UK and the USA have been linked in various ways – politically, economically, culturally – since the 17th century. But in how far has this relationship been ‘special’, as the famous term suggests? And has this ‘special relationship’ survived the end of the Cold War (and the end of the Blair-Bush era), or have global developments made it obsolete? This seminar will trace the “Love-Hate Relations” (as the poet Stephen Spender termed them) from the colonial beginnings over the political developments of the twentieth century to the contemporary situation. Drawing on a wide range of material such as political speeches, feature films, or travel writing, we will pay particular attention to mutual stereotypes and the political rationales behind the invocation of a ‘special relationship’.
1107-3a Age and Age Difference in Anglo-American Culture and Literature
Thursday, 9-11 am, GWZ 2.516
K. Schmieder (Institut für Amerikanistik)
www.lehrbox.de/401
Prüfung: Projektarbeit / Präsentation
“May-December romance,” “sugar daddy,” “jailbait” - these are colloquial phrases implicating relationships that involve people with a considerable age difference. The years since the publication of Nabokov’s seminal novel Lolita in the 1950s have witnessed an ever-intensifying debate on such relationships, and on issues of age and aging in general. In our seminar we will examine the cultural matrix from which these debates arise, and we will investigate their appropriation by texts as diverse as Hal Ashby’s movie “Harold and Maude” and Philip Roth’s novel The Dying Animal.As we utilize the cultural and literary studies toolbox, our analyses of these texts will also be informed by historical, sociological, and psychological frameworks in order to tackle questions like: Why have age and age difference always been sources of strong emotions, such as attraction or repulsion? To what ends have age-related topics been fictionalized during the past decades? How is age employed as an interdisciplinary analytical category?
1107-3b Ethnic and Regional Music Traditions in the United States
Tuesday, 11 am – 1 pm, Commerzbank 2-01
T. Wilson
[lehrbox coming soon]
This seminar explores musical traditions within three American regions: the Midwest, Northeast, and South. Starting from the perspective that musical traditions are best understood within the contexts that they are created and performed, we will examine music and its connections to the cultures and history of specific ethnic and regional communities and consider its connections to broader social movements. We will study representations of Appalachian culture, including the music of Scots-Irish communities and regional adaptions of British ballad traditions. Other traditions to be explored include African American spiritual music, blues, early country, rhythm and blues, rock ‘a’ billy, the American folk revival, Cajun and other French-American vernacular music, Texas-Mexican musical traditions, Midwestern polka, Klezmer, and early rap and hip hop.
The goal of this module is to give BA students the practical chance to realize social projects in their community as part of their professional skills education. The concept of Service Learning comes from the United States where notions of civic commitment have enjoyed a long tradition. Service Learning has been introduced recently at several German universities. At the University of Leipzig, however, this module is the first of its kind. Students can earn 5 ECTS points (5 LP) by attending the Service Learning Project Seminar and Tutorial and by conducting a project in cooperation with a social institution of their choice.