Germanic Languages and Literatures
W. L. Harkness Hall, 432.0788
www.yale.edu/german/graduate.html
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D.
Chair
Carol Jacobs [F]
Rainer Nägele (Acting [Sp])
Director of Graduate Studies
Brigitte Peucker (308 WLH, brigitte.peucker@yale.edu)
Professors
Cyrus Hamlin (Emeritus [Sp]), Carol Jacobs, Winfried Menninghaus (Visiting [Sp]), Rainer Nägele, Brigitte Peucker, Henry Sussman (Visiting [F])
Assistant Professor
Kirk Wetters
Lecturer
William Whobrey
Affiliated Faculty
Seyla Benhabib (Political Science; Philosophy), Ute Frevert (History), Karsten Harries (Philosophy), James Kreines (Philosophy), Christine Mehring (History of Art), Steven Smith (Political Science), Katie Trumpener (Comparative Literature; English), Jay Winter (History), Christopher Wood (History of Art)
Fields of Study
Fields include medieval literature, German literature and culture from the Reformation to the twenty-first century in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland; literary and cultural theory; visuality and German cinema.
Special Admissions Requirement
All students must provide evidence of mastery of German upon application.
Requirements for the Ph.D. Degree
Students are required to demonstrate, besides proficiency in German, a reading knowledge of one other foreign language at the end of the fourth term of study. French is recommended, although occasionally, on consultation with the DGS, other relevant languages may be substituted. The faculty in German considers teaching to be essential to the professional preparation of graduate students. Students normally teach undergraduate language courses under supervision beginning in the third year of study for at least two years. An oral examination must be passed not later than the end of the sixth term of study, and a dissertation prospectus should be submitted soon thereafter, but not later than the beginning of the seventh term of study. All students will be asked to defend the prospectus in an informal discussion with the faculty. The defense will take place before the prospectus is officially approved, usually in September of the seventh term. Students are admitted to candidacy for the Ph.D. upon completion of all predissertation requirements, including the prospectus.
After the submission of the prospectus, the student’s time is devoted to the preparation of the dissertation. A dissertation committee will be set up for each student at work on the dissertation. It is expected that students will periodically pass their work along to members of their committee, so that faculty members in addition to the dissertation adviser can make suggestions well before the dissertation is submitted. Drafts of each chapter must be submitted in a timely fashion to all members of the student’s committee: The first chapter must be submitted to the committee by April 1 of the fourth year of study; the second chapter must be submitted by January 1 of the fifth year. Formal chapter reviews will be held for both of these chapters.
Two concentrations are available to students: Germanic Literature and German Studies. There is a special joint degree with Film Studies; see below.
Special Requirements for the Germanic Literature Concentration
During the first two years of study, students are required to take sixteen term courses, four of which may be taken outside the department.
Special Requirements for the German Studies Concentration
During the first two years of study, students are required to take sixteen term courses, seven of which may be taken outside the department. Students are asked to define an area of concentration upon entry, and will meet with appropriate advisers from both within and outside the department.
Joint Ph.D. Program with Film Studies
The Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures also offers, in conjunction with the Program in Film Studies, a joint Ph.D. in Germanic Languages and Literatures and Film Studies. For further details, see Film Studies. Applicants to the joint program must indicate on their application that they are applying both to Film Studies and to Germanic Languages and Literatures. All documentation within the application should include this information.
Master’s Degrees
M.Phil. See Degree Requirements. Additionally, students in Germanic Languages and Literatures are eligible to pursue a supplemental M.Phil. degree in Medieval Studies. For further details, see Medieval Studies.
M.A. (en route to the PH.D.). Students enrolled in the Ph.D. program may qualify for the M.A. degree upon completion of a minimum of eight graduate term courses and the demonstration of reading knowledge in either Latin or French.
Master’s Degree Program. For the terminal master’s degree students must pass eight term courses, six of which must be in the department, and demonstrate a reading knowledge of French. A comprehensive written examination will be given at the end of the second term. For the quality requirement for the M.A. degree, see Graduate School requirements.
Program materials are available upon request to the Registrar, Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, Yale University, PO Box 208210, New Haven CT 06520-8210; e-mail, german@yale.edu.
Courses
GMAN 560au,Poetics of Representation: Sebald, Rilke, Yeats. Carol Jacobs.
Th 1.30–3.20
Readings of the works of three twentieth-century authors who, in very different ways, challenge conventional modes in which to consider the relationship between literature and what we tend to call reality. Inevitably we have to take into account on the one hand Sebald’s and Yeats’s difficult stances toward what we tend to call the political, as well as Rilke’s apparent withdrawal from the realm of such worldly concerns. We necessarily ask how to think the performance of art and its implicit theorizations as crucial to these questions. Also CPLT 531a.
GMAN 609a, Medieval Songs of Love and War. William Whobrey.
TTh 11.35–12.50
An examination of love poetry from around 1150 to 1250 traditionally associated with Middle High German Minnesang. Readings juxtapose this corpus with contemporary expressions of crusading warfare and imperial politics, providing an appreciation of the medieval poet as warrior, courtier, and artist. Readings in the original Middle High German as well as in translation, to include works by Provençal, French, Arabic, and Italian poets. Also CPLT 588a.
GMAN 633bu,Weimar Cinema. Brigitte Peucker.
T 3.30–5.20, screenings M 7 p.m.
The German cinema, 1919–1930. Expressionist films and films of the New Objectivity. The pressures of technology, psychoanalysis, and the other arts—especially painting—on cinema; issues of spectatorship, visual pleasure, and distraction in the context of a national cinema. Readings by Simmel, Kracauer, Benjamin, and others. Films by Murnau,Lang, Pabst, Brecht, von Sternberg, and others. Conducted in English, with readings in English. Also FILM 762bu.
GMAN 645au,Urban Phantasmagoria: Berlin, Vienna, and Paris. Henry Sussman.
MW 11.35–12.50
Grounding itself in Walter Benjamin’s The Arcades project, a print-medium Web site of the rise of modernity, malls, advertising, gambling, amusement parks, and urban cruising in nineteenth-century Paris, this course pursues these developments as they revolutionize the environment of the major German-speaking cities and as they are documented in literary and cultural criticism. Also CPLT 592a.
GMAN 662bu,Faust and the German Tradition. Cyrus Hamlin.
TTh 1–2.15
The Legend of Faust and his pact with the devil is studied as a model for modern tragedy. Three major works are considered in their historical context: the original Chapbook (1587) and Marlowe’s drama of Dr. Faustus; Goethe’s Faust, Parts One and Two (1770–1832); and Thomas Mann’s Doctor Faustus (1948). Texts are available in German or English; discussion in English. Also CPLT 817b.
GMAN 667au,Hölderlin’s Translations of Sophocles. Rainer Nägele.
Th 3.30–5.20
A close reading of Hölderlin’s translation of the two Sophoclean tragedies Oedipus and Antigone and his commentaries on these two plays. Also CLSS 637au,CPLT 711a.
GMAN 668bu,Modern Poetry: Brecht and Benn. Rainer Nägele.
W 1.30–3.20
Close readings of Bertolt Brecht’s and Gottfried Benn’s poetry as two paradigms of modern German poetry. Also CPLT 712b.
GMAN 669au,Introduction to Freud’s Psychoanalysis. Rainer Nägele, William Sledge.
W 1.30–3.20
The seminar is an introduction to the basic writings of Freud and the fundamental terms of psychoanalysis and their relevance to the humanities.
GMAN 707bu,Venus and Adonis: Beauty in Art and the Cult of the Beautiful Body. Winfried Menninghaus.
M 3.30–5.20
Taking the myths of Venus and Adonis as well as of Orpheus and Eurydice as its point of departure, the seminar offers a multifaceted approach to dealing with the power and failures of beauty and art. Readings include the extant versions of the Greek myths; Shakespeare’s Venus and Adonis and other versions of the myth by Ronsard, Friedrich Schlegel, Georges Bataille, and others; philosophical accounts of beauty (Plato, Baumgarten, Burke, Kant, and Nietzsche); as well as the “theories” of beauty in evolutionary biology, psychoanalysis (Freud), and recent empirical psychology. The pertinent texts are available in both German and English versions; discussion in German. Also CPLT 951b.
GMAN 708bu,Goethe’s Elective Affinities. Winfried Menninghaus.
W 3.30–5.20
This seminar is devoted to the close reading of Goethe’s Elective Affinities, which is at once one of the author’s most enigmatic texts and a central and exceptional work within the tradition of the European novel. This course also intensively pursues the novel’s points of intersection with other contemporary discourses, including the natural sciences, classical literary allusions, gardening, fashion, modern economics, education, gender, and politics. The final sessions of the course address Walter Benjamin’s famous essay on the novel. Readings and discussion in German.
GMAN 900a,b, Directed Reading.
By arrangement with the faculty.
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