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First semester

Second semester

A history of the German Cinema, 1945-1980s

The language of film

 

 

Presentation Topics

 

 

 

Presentations will be completed in groups of 2-3. They should last 15-20 minutes and raise issues for discussion. They can be formal or informal, invite participation or not, and should be exploited as an opportunity to experiment. You should link your topic directly to the film or films in question. You are also encouraged to draw links between different films and different periods (i.e. the theme of sexuality in Abgeschminkt might be compared with the same them in Alice in den Städten).

 

Presentations are not assessed, but there will be feedback. Presentations should also show evidence of further reading and be accompanied by a hand-out and bibliography.

 

 

Presentation Topics and Suggestions for Reading

 

 

 

Land des Schweigens                                                         Die Last der Vergangenheit

 

Christa Klages                                                                      Feminism/The Student Movement

 

Katzelmacher/Die grünen Ameisen                                  Gastarbeiter and Racism

                                   

Das Versprechen                                                                 German Unification

 

Abgeschminkt                                                                       Gender and Sexuality

 

Sonnenallee                                                                         Ostalgie and the GDR

                       

Aimée und Jaguar                                                               The Nazi Past Again and The Berlin Republic

 

 

Suggested Reading

 

® are especially recommended

You may also find useful information on the internet, using a search engine such as www.yahoo.de, or the departmental Sprungbrett ins Internet

 

Vergangenheitsbewältigung

Coming to terms with the past from 1945-1970s.

®Rob Burns, German Cultural Studies

®Mary Fulbrook, German identity after the Holocaust

Stefan Berger, The Search for Normality

Jeffrey Herf, Divided Memory: The Nazi Past in the Two Germanies

 

Feminism:

Feminism: politics, theory and relationship to the student movement. Feminism and Film.

®Julia Knight, Women and the New German Cinema

®Sandra Frieden (ed.), Gender and German Cinema: Feminist Interventions

®Ingrid Sharp’s course on Women in Germany: website

®Ingrid Sharp, Women in Germany: The German Women's Movement

Ingrid Sharp, Women in Germany from Division to Unification

Eva Kolinsky, Women in contemporary Germany: Life, Work and Politics

Gisela Helwig und Hildegard Maria Nickel (eds.) Frauen in Deutschland, 1945-1992

 

Gastarbeiter and Racism:

Immigrants to Germany, the Nazi past.

®Günter Wallraff, Ganz unten

Günter Wallraff (trans. Martin Chalmers), Lowest of the Low

®Ulrich Herbert, A history of Foreign Labor in Germany, 1880-1980

Philip L. Martin, The Unfinished story: Turkish Labour Migration to Western Europe

 

German Unification:

Debates surrounding German Unification, winners and losers, victims and perpetrators.

®Mary Fulbrook, Anatomy of a Dictatorship: Inside the GDR, 1949-1989

®Mary Fulbrook, The Divided Nation: A History of Germany, 1918-1990

®Harold James and Marla Stone (eds.), When the Wall Came Down: Reactions to German Unification

Jeffrey Herf: Divided memory : the Nazi Past in the Two Germanys

Mary Fulbrook, 'Wir sind ein Volk'?: Reflections on German Unification

Elizabeth Boa and Janet Wharton (eds.), Women and the Wende: Social Effects and Cultural Reflections of the German Unification Process

Richard T. Gray and Sabine Wilke (eds.), German Unification and its Discontents: Documents from the Peaceful Revolution

Stuart Taberner, ‘Debates on German Unification in Margarethe von Trotta’s Das Versprechen’, in Jill Forbes and Sarah Street (eds.), European Cinema, Macmillan, 2000.

 

Gender and Sexuality:

Gender, the German past, German identity, and sexuality in the 1990s.

® Thomas Elsaesser and Michael Wedel (eds.), The BFI Companion to German Cinema (Chapter: German Cinema in the 1990s)

Julia Knight, Women and the New German Cinema

Sandra Frieden (ed.), Gender and German Cinema: Feminist Interventions

Stuart Taberner, ‘Masculinity and America in Wim Wenders’ Alice in den Städten’, in Jill Forbes and Sarah Street (eds.), European Cinema, Macmillan, 2000.

 

Ostalgie and the GDR

 

Ostalgie-Nächte

Dev-Ossi-Onalien

50 Jahre BRD | Heute - Ostalgie-Partys

FAeV - Ostalgie-Party

Musik der Freiheit - DER SPIEGEL - SPIEGEL ONLINE

Amazon.de -- Ostalgie

DDR Grenzschild - Die DDR im World Wide Web

Chris Flockton and Eva Kolinsky, Recasting East Germany: Social Transformation after The GDR

 

The Nazi past Again:

®Stefan Berger, The Search for Normality

Introductory lecture to Final Year Course: The meaning of the Holocaust in post-unification Germany

Stuart Taberner, ‘Wie kannst du mich lieben?’: ‘Normalising’ the Relationship between Germans and Jews in the 1990s’ Films Aimee und Jaguar and Meschugge (from me)

 

 

Return to Front Page

First semester

Second semester

A history of the German Cinema, 1945-1980s

The language of film