Teaching SS 05

Introductory Seminar:
"Life Writing in North American Regions"

Wednesday 10 am, 304 / K225, Unterrichtsraum

Entsprechend von Themenschwerpunkten in meinem Arbeitsbereich und Lehrangebot werden fiktive oder fiktionalisierte Lebenszeugnisse vor allem aus regionalen Kulturen in Nordamerika genommen werden. Neben einigen poetischen Zeugnissen wird eine Anthologie von Suzanne Jones, die spätestens Anfang März in einer ausreichenden Anzahl von Exemplaren zur Verfügung stehen wird, Verwendung finden und darin die retrospektive Aufarbeitung der Kindheit und Jugend im amerikanischen Süden thematisiert werden. Diese Anthologie wird durch einen Reader, der Gedichte und einige kanadische Texte enthält, ergänzt.

"Eden in Jeopardy"
(Ecological writings in North America from the 18th to the 20th century)

VO, Thursday 3 pm, 325 and K 525, Unterrichtsraum

The lecture course will consider the tension between the old belief in the abundant resources of nature in the New World and the legitimacy of the appropriation of the land in U.S.-American texts from the 19th and 20th centuries and the growing ecological consciousness and unease at the exploitation of these resources. It will also examine texts by Canadians who have similarly experienced both the urge to fully exploit the resources of their vast country and have become aware of the losses incurred by the utilizaton of the fauna and the flora of their land. The texts to be analyzed will range from 18th century examples of a sensitive response to natural scenery (for instance, by William Bartram) and fictional representations concerning reservations about the wasteful use of resources by pioneers (cf. James Fenimore Cooper's The Pioneers, excerpts), and nature writing by settlers both in the U.S.A. and Canada (cf. Catherine Parr Traill) to late 19th and early 20th century conservationist efforts to establish national parks and preserve the ecology. Henry David Thoreaus's Walden and Susan F. Coopers's Rural Hours (a selection of which will be studied) will provide evidence for the transcendentalist and post-romantic responses to nature in the 19th century.

While the focus in the course will be on these earlier examples, the discussion will also include both Canadian and U.S.-American documents for the ecological movement in the 20th century, with Mary Austin (The Land of Little Rain) and Edward Abbey (Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness) providing illustrations for the ecological awareness prompted by the threat to the ecology in the American South-West. Nature and fiction writers from British Columbia like Jack Hodgins (The Resurrection of Joseph Bourne) will furnish examples for the ecological concerns of Canadian authors.

A reader with excerpts from several of the texts will be provided. In addition participants are expected to get copies of H. D. Thoreau's Walden, Edward Abbey's Desert Solitaire, and Jack Hodgins' The Resurrection of Joseph Bourne. 15 copies of the two latter texts will be available in our office.

Literary Seminar:
"Transatlantic Memories in Canadian Fiction"

SE: Tuesday 4 pm, Seminar Room 5

Auf dem Programm stehen Erzähltexte von Repräsentanten ethnischer Gruppen, die aus dem europäischen Raum nach Kanada eingewandert sind oder einer nachfolgenden Generation angehören. Damit soll ein wichtiges Element der zeitgenössischen Literatur Anglokanadas behandelt und an die in Proseminaren von mir selbst bzw. von unserer Gastprofessorin Rosmarin Heidenreich angebotenen Lehrveranstaltungen angeknüpft werden.

Specialized Seminar for M.A. and Ph. D. Candidates

Monday 4pm, Seminar Room 5

This course is intended to serve as a forum for students working on a diploma thesis or a doctoral dissertation. Participants will be expected to report on work in progress and to deal with the methodological and technical aspects of their research.

Furthermore is the course intended as a supplement to the interdisciplinary field trip "The Transatlantic Exchange: Europe in the American South - The American South in Europe to the Deep South from Atlanta via Athens, Milledgeville, Auburn, Tuskegee, Montgomery, Oxford, Memphis, the Mississippi Delta, Jackson, Natchez, Baton Rouge to New Orleans from March 18th to April 3rd.

The seminar will be held on the following dates: 4. April, 11. April, 25. April, 9. May, 23. May, 6. June, 13. June

Impressum