GETR 3462/HIEU 3462:

Neighbors and Enemies in Modern Germany (Spring 2016)

T/Th 2:00-3:15, New Cabell Hall 209

Manuela Achilles (Departments of German and History)

Email: ma6cq@virginia.edu

Office: NCH 233; NAU 255,

Office Hours: T 11:00am – 1:00 pm in NCH 233, Th 11:00 am – 1:00 pm in NAU 255

Course Outline

A biblical injunction, first articulated in Leviticus and then elaborated in the Christian teachings, stipulates that one should love one’s neighbor as oneself. This course explores the friend/enemy nexus in German history, literature and culture. Of particular interest is the figure of the neighbor as both an imagined extension of the self, and as an object of fear or even hatred. We will examine the vulnerability and anxiety generated by Germany’s unstable and shifting territorial borders, as well as the role that fantasies of foreign infiltration played in defining German national identity. We will also investigate the racial and sexual politics manifested in Germany’s real or imagined encounters with various foreign “others.” Most importantly, this course will study the tensions in German history and culture between a chauvinist belief in German racial or cultural superiority and moments of genuine openness to strangers. In the concluding part of this course, we will consider the changing meanings of friendship and hospitality in a globalizing world.

Assignments and Grading

• 20% Attendance and Participation
• 20% Reading Responses
• 10% Oral Presentation
• 10% Short Essay #1
• 15% Short Essay #2
• 25% Short Essay #3

Attendance policy: Attendance in class is mandatory. You will be allowed one unexcused sick day, after which further unexcused absences will have a negative effect on your grade. Please arrive in class on time.

Oral presentation: Once during the semester, you will be asked to introduce the materials we have read or viewed for that class. This presentation should last ten to fifteen minutes. You should end your presentation with three discussion questions. Feel free to bring in hand-outs or display images.

Reading Responses: Once a week, on the days that are marked with an asterisk (*), you are expected to respond in writing to the materials assigned for that day or week. Your task is to identify (1) the text passage or film scene that you found objectively most important and (2) a text passage or film scene you found subjectively most surprising or thought provoking. Please add a short explanation as to why you chose the particular text passages or film scenes. Your responses should not exceed one double-spaced page and must be posted under “assignments” on Collab. The submission deadline is 1:30 pm on the day on which a response is due. Collab will not accept late responses.

Your reading response should be typed, and should be no longer than one double-spaced page. You may be asked to explain your choices in class. Your weekly responses will give me an opportunity to monitor your progress and discuss it with you if I sense your grasp of the material isn’t perhaps as developed as it ought to be.

Written assignments: Over the course of this semester, you will write three short essays (5 pages each). The assignments for the first two papers will be handed out approximately one week before the due date of these papers. There will be no pre-assigned questions for your final paper. Rather, a key component of this task will be your ability to define your paper topic in consultation with me. Please submit your papers through Collab.

All written work should be word-processed, double-spaced, in 12-point Times New Roman font on paper with 1” margins. You will receive more information on all of the assignments as we get closer to their due dates.

Grading policy: Your papers will be graded on clarity, creativity, organization, writing style, and the effective use of evidence from the readings, films, lectures and discussions.

No late papers will be accepted without penalty except in cases of documented illness or severe personal emergency. The penalty for unexcused late essays is 1/3 of a grade for each day the essay is late. If you are concerned about meeting any of the deadlines, please notify me ahead of time.

Please Note: UVa prohibits recording and transmission of classroom lectures and discussions by students unless written permission from the class instructor has been obtained and all students in the class as well as guest speakers have been informed that audio/video recording may occur. Recordings, course materials, and lecture notes may not be exchanged or distributed for commercial purposes, for compensation, or for any other purpose other than study by students enrolled in the class. Public distribution of such materials may constitute copyright infringement in violation of federal or state law, or University policy. Violation of this policy may subject a student to disciplinary action under the University’s Standards of Conduct. More information at:

http://uvapolicy.virginia.edu/policy/prov-016

Honor: It is expected that all wording and ideas presented in any written work handed in for this class are your own unless you have explicitly credited your source/s. It is also assumed that any work turned in for this class was composed exclusively for this class. If you have questions about the honor code and related issues, please go to:

http://www.virginia.edu/honor/

The use of laptops, i-pads, or cell phones is not permitted in this class. Please plan on taking your notes the old fashioned way (pen and paper). J

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Course Readings

Books Available for Purchase (at the University of Virginia Bookstore)

• Christopher Browning, Ordinary Men, ISBN: 0060995068
• Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents, ISBN: 0-393-30158-3
• Anna Funder, Stasiland, ISBN: 1862076553
• Immanuel Kant, Perpetual Peace, ISBN: 1596055499
• Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Nathan the Wise, ISBN: 0312401523
• Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, The Communist Manifesto, ISBN: 0-7178-0241-8
• Michael E. Nolan, The Inverted Mirror: ISBN: 1845453018
• Carl Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, ISBN: 0226738922
• Elie Wiesel, Night, ISBN: 0374500010

Required Readings on Collab

• Karen Hagemann, “Francophobia and Patriotism: Anti-French Images and Sentiments in Prussia and Northern Germany During the Anti-Napoleonic Wars”, French History, Vol. 18, No. 4, 404-425.
• Ernst Jünger, Storm of Steel (New York 2004), 91-120.
• Robert Moeller, “Remembering the War in a Nation of Victims: West German Pasts in the 1950”, in: The Miracle Years: A Cultural History of West Germany 1949-1968, ed. Hanna Schissler (Princeton and Oxford 2001), 83-109.
• Victor Klemperer, I will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years, 1933-1941 (New York 1999), 289-324 (“1939”).
• Primo Levi, “The Gray Zone”, in: The Drowned and the Saved (New York 1989), 36-69.
• Bill Niven, “The GDR and Memory of the Bombing of Dresden”, in Germans as Victims, ed. Bill Niven (New York 2006), 109-129.
• Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front (New York 1958), 199-229.
• Günter Wallraff, The Lowest of the Low, translated by Martin Chalmers (London 1988).
• Zafer Şenocak, Atlas of a Tropical Germany: Essays on Politics and Culture, 1990-1998 (University of Nebraska Press 2000), pp. 1-9; 32-36; 72-73; 83-98.

Online Editions of Required Texts, and Useful Links

• Kant, “What is Enlightenment?:” http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/kant-whatis.html
• Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Nathan the Wise: A Dramatic Poem in Five Acts, translated by W. Taylor: http://digital.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=3820

Required Online Documentaries on Collab

• The Asch Conformity Experiment (1951).
• The Milgram Obedience to Authority Study (1962).
• The Stanford Prison Experiment by Philip Zimbardo (1971).
• Eye of the Storm (USA 1971; on Jane Elliott’s Brown Eyes, Blue Eyes Exercise).
• A Class Divided (USA 1985; on Jane Elliott’s Brown Eyes, Blue Eyes Exercise).

Films on Reserve

• The White Ribbon, by Michael Haneke (2009) – VIDEO.DVD12460
• Joyeux Noel/Merry Christmas, by Christian Carion (2005) – VIDEO.DVD 06762
• Metropolis, by Fritz Lang (1927) – VIDEO.DVD 02793
• Europa, Europa, by Agnieszka Holland (1991) – VIDEO.VHS 10851
• Dresden (2006), directed by Roland Suso Richter – VIDEO.DVD 09112
• Head On (Gegen die Wand), by Fatih Akin – VIDEO.DVD 06336 2005
• The Lives of Others, by F. H. von Donnersmarck (2006) – VIDEO. DVD 07685

The video reserves can be viewed at the viewing stations of the Robertson Media Center.

For more information, please contact Manuela Achilles, ma6cq@virginia.edu.