Deadline to apply for this year’s Berkeley-Cologne-Yale Summer School on “Writing Scenes and Reading Scenes,” at Yale University, August 15-19.  More details here.

April 28 — “The Crisis in the Humanities” – A discussion with Prof. Chad Wellmon (University of Virginia) and Prof. Karen Feldman (UC Berkeley)  at 5 pm in 282 Dwinelle Hall.  More details here.

April 19 & 20 – German Cabaret: Verkehrte Zeiten at 7:00 pm in B-4 Dwinelle Hall on April 19. A repeat performance will be held at 6:00 pm on April 20 in Dwinelle B-4. More details here.

PROF. ALBRECHT KOSCHORKE Poetic Jurists, Geniuses in Office, Romantic Bureaucrats: Administration and Poetry in Early Modern Germany   Abstract According to Nicholas Boyle’s Very Short Introduction (2008) two things can be said about German literature before 1800. First: Early modern German literature is above all a Protestant phenomenon. Second: It is mainly written by civil servants.   Putting Protestantism aside, the lecture will ask: What are the effects on the institution of civil service when an important part of the personnel clings to literary ambitions? In other words, the question is not only: What does bureaucracy do with poetry? But…

Karen Feldman discusses the new book “Permanent Crisis:  The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age,” with the authors, Prof. Paul Reitter and Prof. Chad Wellmon, who are alumni of our Department.  12-1 pm Online.  More info here.

Big Give, our annual fundraising blitz, has been online since 2014 — including last year’s event, which took place March 2021, at the moment life changed around the world. On Thursday, March 10, 2022, we invite the Cal community to rally in a special Big Give for the continued excellence and influence of UC Berkeley’s global solutions, peerless students, and life-changing research.   Please donate to the Department of German.

Per Urlaub (PhD, German Studies, Stanford) is Associate College Professor and Associate Dean of the Language Schools at Middlebury College. In his administrative role, he supports program development, curricular innovations, program reviews, faculty development, and hiring at twelve summer language programs in Vermont as well as Middlebury’s graduate degree programs offered in collaboration with overseas sites in Europe, Latin America, and Africa. Before moving to Middlebury in 2017, Per Urlaub was an Associate Professor of German at The University of Texas at Austin, where he also served as a Language Program Director, Director of Undergraduate Studies, and Director of Assessment.…

Arrested Mobilities: Stillness, Power and Modernity The German Department’s annual graduate conference will take place on Zoom Friday, Feb. 25th (8am-1pm) and Saturday, Feb. 26th (8am-1:45pm). The topic is “Arrested Mobilities: Stillness, Power and Modernity”. We have a small in-person reception planned on Friday at 4:30pm in Dwinelle 370 for anyone who’s interested in discussing the conference while enjoying light refreshments.  As early as the 1920’s, Robert Musil remarked on the enormous effort it takes to stand still in a world that demands constant motion. Reflecting on the zooming street he sees through his window, the protagonist of Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften comments: “Könnte…

Reading – Literary | April 2 | 12-1:30 p.m. |  Zoom Featured Performer:  Zafer Şenocak Panelist/Discussants:  Kristin Dickinson; Deniz Göktürk, University of California, Berkeley Sponsors:  Institute of European Studies, Department of German, Center for German and European Studies, German Consulate General San Francisco, Pacific Regional Office of the German Historical Institute Washington, German Program, University of California, Davis This event is the second in a series of workshop conversations with authors, “Archives of Migration: The Power of Fiction in Times of Fake News” organized by Deniz Göktürk (UC Berkeley, Department of German, Multicultural Germany Project and Transit Journal) and Elisabeth Krimmer (UC Davis, German Department, Migration and Aesthetics Project). The…