Reviews special grammatical topics, reading, and conversation. Students have the option of taking the internationally recognized exam Zertifikat Deutsch in GRMN 3010. Department enforced prereq., four semesters of college German or equivalent. Open to freshmen with instructor consent.
Review of Russian grammar coordinated with reading, speaking, writing, and understanding modern Russian. Uses some texts from modern Russian literature. Department enforced prereq., RUSS 2020 (minimum grade C-).
Expands and refines skills acquired in GRMN 3010. Students acquire a varied, precise, and idiomatically advanced vocabulary; an understanding of different registers, from the casual to the very formal; and an ability to communicate effectively in spoken and written German in a variety of social situations, including professional life. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 3010 (minimum grade C-).
Develops the type of advanced reading knowledge of the four closely related Scandinavian languages (Swedish, Danish, and the two Norwegian standards) that will prepare students for their senior thesis, and for possible graduate work. Readings will help students see relationships and connections operating across national and linguistic borders within the Nordic region. Department enforced prereqs., NORW/SWED 2120 and NORW/SWED 3900 (all minimum grade C-).
Introduces students to the language of German business and economic life. Provides insights into everyday business practices and institutions, including Germany's position in the European and world markets. Emphasizes acquiring basic business vocabulary and writing business letters and resumes in German. Prepares students for the exam Deutsch fuer den Beruf, a diploma recognized worldwide by business and industry. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 2020 (minimum grade C-).
Studies general commercial practices, vocabulary, and terminology applied in various business transactions. Emphasizes oral and written communication and correspondence. Department enforced prereq., RUSS 2020 (minimum grade C-).
Enhances heritage student competence and performance in Russian language. The course offers intensive review of Russian grammar and focuses on developing advanced reading, writing and translation skills. Readings are selected from a wide range of contemporary writings that reflect current issues in Russia. Credit not granted for this course and RUSS 4010.
Examines selected literary texts. Emphasizes longer unedited texts as well as critical skills. May be taken either before or after GRMN 3120. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 2020 (minimum grade C-).
Examines selected literary texts of various periods. Emphasizes longer texts and critical skills. May be taken either before or after GRMN 3110. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 2020 (minimum grade C-).
Examines selected interdisciplinary texts from the German literary and philosophical tradition. Topics address issues central to philosophical inquiry, and may include knowledge and its limits, mind and body, determinism and free will, reason and religious belief, and ethical problems. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 2020 or 2030 (minimum grade C-).
Examines issues pervading contemporary German literature, such as concerns of youth, gender, stereotyping as it affects women and men in their relations with one another, loneliness and sexual frustration, work experiences, and other issues. Department enforced restriction: ability to read unedited German and to speak German.
Examines literary and theoretical texts in German about the relationship between literature and politics. Topics may include history and revolution, political theater, feminist aesthetics, or terrorism. Readings and discussion in German. Department enforced prereq., GRMN 2020 or GRMN 2030 (minimum grade C-).
Explores contemporary Nordic culture and society with special focus on Iceland. Emphasis is on the relationship between historical, geographic, artistic, and political forces in Iceland and their effects on culture and society. Provides insight into the life and attitudes of contemporary Icelanders and stresses their place in the global culture of today. Taught in English. Recommended prereq., SCAN 2201. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: contemporary societies.
Surveys the mythology and heathen cult practices of the Old Norse world. Students learn to read mythological texts and study the major gods (Odin, Thor, Frey and Freyja, among others), along with other mythological beings. The course examines and evaluates evidence for beliefs and cult practices in texts, art, archeological finds, and other sources. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Examines the Nordic region's influence on social realism, expressionism, and postwar literature, including such themes as women in society, nature and industrialization, and identity and angst. May include works by Ibsen, Strindberg, Dinesen, and Nobel Prize winners Lagerlof, Hamsun, Undset, and Lagerkvist. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Advanced introduction to medieval Icelandic saga with readings in the family, outlaw, skald, and legendary sagas as well as the main scholarly approaches to this unique literature. Topics include honor, blood feud, fate, sexuality/gender, oral composition, and legend. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Introduces the rich tradition of Scandinavian oral narrative. Looks at relationships between the various genres of oral narrative and their historical, social, and cultural contexts. Genres studied may include ballad, fairy tale, rural legend, and urban legend. Explores various interpretive methodologies. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Examines Nordic colonial enterprise and the relationship between the Scandinavian center and colonial peripheries from the Arctic to the Caribbean, Africa, and India. Studies colonial and postcolonial cultures, and postcolonial criticism and theory. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: human diversity.
Examines the role and status of women and marginalized social classes in the Nordic countries, whose societies have been heralded as egalitarian models since the twentieth century. Texts include a variety of media, from literature to sociological works to artifacts of political and popular culture. Taught in English. Same as WMST 3208. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: human diversity.
Advanced introduction to contemporary Nordic literature and film. Readings/screenings of recent translated Nordic texts and films, presenting a broad spectrum of contemporary issues, along with current critique and theoretical approaches. Topics: history, culture, translation, gender/sexuality, nationalidentity, minority issues, etc. Taught in English.
Surveys Russian cinema in historical and cultural context from early 20th century to the present. Taught in English. Recommended prereq., RUSS 2221 or FILM 1502. Same as FILM 3211. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Examines forms, genres and social functions of laughter in Slavic cultures (Russian, Polish, Czech, Serbian, and others). Analysis of the carnivalesque, grotesque, and irony in the works of Gogol, Chapek, Hashek, Lem, Kundera, Gombrowicz, Kharms, Zoshchenko, Ilf and Petrov, Kusturica, Kieslewsky, and other authors; also provides an introduction to literature and film of Eastern Europe. Taught in English.
Examines Russo-Soviet fiction literature and film. Within this popular genre, writers conceive and criticize social utopias, thus creating works situated between the poles of utopia and dystopia. Through discussions of Soviet and post-Soviet science fiction, utopian and distopian alike, the course introduces a Russo-Soviet "alternative modernity" and studies its historical developmental. All readings are in English. Taught in English. Approved for arts and sciences core curriculum: literature and the arts.
Examines the relationship between politics, economics, aesthetics, and the way moral and social issues are treated in noteworthy Russian films of the last 20 years. Taught in English. Same as FILM 3301.
