Professor: Larrisa Stiglich
4 credits
The history of Germany in the 20th century is infamously tumultuous. In the short span of three decades, German citizens were both enthusiastic participants in and hapless victims of their state’s transformation from a powerful global empire to a fledgling liberal democracy, and then again from a Nazi dictatorship into competing Cold War states championing capitalist democracy and communism, respectively. This same time period witnessed similarly profound transformations in gender roles. Put differently, what it meant to be a good German woman or a good German man changed dramatically over the first half of the century and was hotly contested along the way.
In this course we will examine the state as one of many institutions that produces meaning about gender. Beginning with a unit to help frame gender and sexuality (alongside race and ethnicity, class, and others) as cultural constructions, the course proceeds chronologically through subsequent German states. We will consider literature, art, film, and other media and read scholarly sources to understand the myriad ways that ideas surrounding gender and sexuality were socially, politically, and culturally constructed and maintained in Germany during the 20th century. These conversations will, in turn, help us to recognize and deconstruct similar processes at work in our own contemporary social and cultural contexts.
Graduation Requirement: This class will fulfill a Social Science Colloquium and the Global Perspectives (GP) cultural literacy requirement. If the student has already taken a Social Science Colloquium, this class will fulfill both of the following requirements: an Elective Colloquium and Global Perspective cultural literacy.