GMST 012. Texts in Context: Topics in German Culture and Society from the Reformation until Today

This fourth-semester course is designed to advance linguistic skills through engagement with a specific topic. Studying literary, artistic, journalistic, and historical sources, students enhance their analytical, writing, and communication skills. This course is the gateway to all upper level courses in the German Studies curriculum. Topics alternate every year.

Topic for Spring ‘25: Did you know that Germany-based media users are avid drivers of technological and cultural change within the transnational European media landscape? This course will investigate German media from their inception as private and public enterprises to the streaming era. How the different media forms interact with and shape socio-political change along with national identity formation will be one focus. How content, form, and reception modes have adapted to shifting audience demographics and new technologies will be another. Pairing box office successes with critically acclaimed films, watching high quality television dramas from the network era to Netflix, comparing radio plays to podcasts and domestically produced video games to globally accessible megahits, students will screen and play weekly content together, blog on their media use, and engage in individual and team projects and presentations.

Topic for Spring ‘26: Nature in German Literature and Culture. Eligible for ENVS in S’26. Taught in German.
Prerequisite: GMST 003 or Placement Test Score of 500 or above. Taught in German.
Humanities.
1 credit.
Eligible for CPLT, ENVS.
Spring 2026. Hicke.
Catalog chapter: Modern Languages and Literatures: German Studies
Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/german-studies

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