Core Courses
IS101 Plato’s Republic and Its Interlocutors
AY/BA1/Bard1 Core Course
Module: Greek Civilization
Instructors: Ewa Atanassow, Tracy Colony, David Hayes, Hans Stauffacher, Aaron Tugendhaft, Francesco Giusti
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 14:00-15:30
Bard College Berlin's core curriculum begins with a semester-long engagement with Plato’s Republic in dialog with the main works and movements that shaped its cultural and intellectual context. Republic offers a unique point of entry into the epochal literary, philosophical, and political achievements of fifth and fourth century Athens. It depicts, and draws us into, a conversation about ethical, political, aesthetic, religious, epistemic, and literary questions that are fundamental to human life. Rather than a series of separate treatises, Republic treats these questions as the subject of a single investigation that transcends disciplinary boundaries as we have come to conceive them. And while it may be said to contain a “social contract” theory, a theory of psychology, a theology, a critique of mimetic art, a theory of education, and a typology of political regimes, it is reducible to none of these. This book, perhaps in a manner unlike any other written before or after, offers an illuminating starting point for any set of inquiries one might wish to pursue today. In this course we shall be particularly attentive to the dialogic character of Plato’s writing and to its exchanges with other authors, works, genres and modes of thought. We read Republic alongside Homer’s Iliad; Aristophanes’ Clouds; selections from Sappho; Hesiod’s Works and Days; selections from Parmenides; the architecture of the Parthenon, Euripides’ Bacchae and Plato’s Apology. Attending to the interlocutors with which Republic is engaged, we will strive to better understand and evaluate its arguments and drama. Reading and discussing the dialogue together, we aim to become informed and engaging interlocutors for Plato and for one another.
Syllabus
IS102 Renaissance Florence
BA2 Core Course
Module: Renaissance Art and Thought
Instructors: Ian Lawson, Geoff Lehman, Katalin Makkai, Laura Scuriatti
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
In this course we examine the visual and intellectual culture of Renaissance Florence. A sustained engagement with a number of principal monuments in Florentine painting, sculpture, and architecture provides the basis for a consideration of key values within the development of Renaissance art that also shape, more broadly, the thought, cultural practices, and everyday experiences of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Renaissance could arguably be characterized as an historical period in which the visual arts played the leading role in the culture as a whole. Thus the focus on works of visual art, in a sustained dialogue with literary, philosophical, and political texts of the period, opens upon a consideration of trans-disciplinary problems such as the emergence of new models of subjectivity and objectivity, the relationship between religious and secular experiences, the framing of early modern political thought, and the origins of the scientific method. The course is structured around four principal topics, each a defining value for the visual arts between the thirteenth and the sixteenth centuries that is also central to the development of Renaissance thought: self-reflexivity, perspective, harmony and grace, humanism. The direct experience, evaluation, and interpretation of individual works of art are a crucial part of the course, and with this in mind there will be several visits to Berlin museums – specifically, the Gemäldegalerie and the Bode Museum, with their extensive Renaissance collections – to encounter works of art firsthand.
Syllabus
IS303 Origins of Political Economy
BA3/4 Core Course
Module: Origins of Political Economy
Instructor: Irwin Collier, Boris Vormann, Hanan Toukan, Christian Wöhst
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 9:00-10:30 (Section A) | Fri 14:00-17:15 (Section B)
This course explores the intellectual history of the contemporary disciplines of economics, political science and sociology, by examining the historical origins of the discourse and practice known as “political economy”: the means and processes by which societies and populations provide for their own survival and development. It offers an introduction to the reach and implications of this endeavor, its relationship to questions of law, sovereignty and political representation. It equally addresses changing state-market relationships and normative discourses about the best ways to organize societies as they echo in the liberal and critical traditions of Western political thought. In keeping with its attention to the formative history of modern categories and disciplines of knowledge, the course also addresses the ways in which changes in the (understanding of) political economy have influenced literary texts and cultural exchange. It allows students to understand, draw upon and critique the historical formulation of contemporary problems and concerns such as inequality, the sources and circulation of wealth, and the connection and differentiation between the economic and political spheres.
Syllabus
IS123 Academic Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences
Module: Senior Core Colloquium
Instructor: Ulrike Wagner, Tamara Kolarić, Matthias Hurst
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 9:00-12:15
This seminar is a training in the methods of academic research. Focusing on representative contemporary research in the humanities and the social sciences, it supports students in proceeding with their own individual research projects by focusing on the essential elements of independent scholarly work: the choice of a topic or object of study; the outline of the main components of an article or scholarly paper; finding, gathering, collating and interpreting the sources needed for the project; correct citation, attribution, and bibliographical documentation, and lastly, the effective presentation of the final work in structure and style, as well as peer review and constructive feedback. Including the participation of thesis supervisors and other faculty members, this course meets in fall term and in spring term.
Syllabus (Ulrike Wagner)
Syllabus (Tamara Kolarić)
Art and Aesthetics Foundational Modules
FA105 Contemporary Materials and Techniques
Module: Artistic Practice
Instructor: John von Bergen
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 14:00-17:15
This course is a comprehensive introduction to sculpture as a medium that has evolved in many diverse directions over the last century, and is accelerating as an expansive, critical medium for art production in the 21st Century. The concentration of this course is a hands-on workshop that explores materials and techniques, supplemented by slide lectures, reading and writing assignments, and off-site meets (off-campus workshop, museum / gallery visits, artist studio, etc.). Workshops will allow students to learn about a large range of materials that will be explored further by individual projects, as we investigate the advantages and disadvantages of many materials that include rubber, wood, styrofoam, plaster, plastics, polymer-gypsum, polymer-webbing, wax and found objects. We also will explore basic construction, various mold-making techniques and the importance of maintaining health and safety standards in one's studio. Please Note: A limited supply of materials will be offered to students. Some students may need to contribute their own funds / resources for completing projects.
Syllabus
FA103 Found Fragments & Layered Lines: mixed-media techniques for drawing and collage
Module: Art Objects and Experience / Artistic Practice
Instructor: John Kleckner
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 14:00-17:15
This is a hands-on studio art course exploring contemporary and historical approaches to drawing and collage. The goal of this course is to develop and enhance each student's skills in visual thinking through the creation of mixed-media drawings and collages of found printed fragments. Students will gather printed materials from Berlin's famous Flohmärkte (flea markets) to use in creating original collages; students will also draw figures & object arrangements, make abstractions from nature by working outdoors, work collaboratively on large-scale drawings, develop their own systematic approach for generating compositions, and experiment with the expressive possibilities of combining text and imagery. A central focus will be exploring the potential to create new and surprising meanings and content resulting from the juxtaposition of found fragments and drawn lines. The semester culminates in the creation of a body of original artwork that will be shown during the “Open Studios” group exhibition. The majority of classes are studio sessions. There will also be a number of group critiques, image presentations, and artist studio / gallery visits. The ideal student will be highly motivated, with a strong interest in studying and producing art, and must be comfortable with presenting their artistic creations with peers in class discussions.
Syllabus
AH222 Expressionism, Bauhaus and beyond: German Art and National Identity in the 20th century
Module: Art and Artists in Context
Instructor: Aya Soika
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 9:00-12:15
The question as to whether there is any such thing as “German Art” has preoccupied artists ever since notions of national identity first emerged. This course aims to investigate the search for a national art in late nineteenth- and twentieth-century German culture and its relevance to wider social and intellectual developments. Among the so-called Expressionists, for example, the wish to establish a genuinely “German” style and subject matter was central at a time when many younger painters felt the impulse to liberate themselves from what they perceived as the dominance of (French-inspired) Impressionism. In contrast, the Bauhaus School of Art and Design, founded in 1919 at the end of the long and traumatic First World War, is generally presented as more international in outlook. But was it really? And how do these two movements fit into past and present debates about the relationship between art and national identity? After 1933 many of the modern movements that had emerged since 1910 – regardless of their differences in terms of political outlook or social agenda – were abominated and proscribed by the Nazis. But even the “Third Reich” struggled with the question of what constituted an art that could be deemed “German”. After the atrocities of the Second World War, efforts to come to terms with the horrors of the past led artists and art historians to a radically different, self-reflexive treatment of Germany’s national identity. This course looks at the “long” 20th century; using two important current exhibitions as the cornerstone for our exploration: the centenary exhibition in the Bauhaus museum; and the Nolde exhibition entitled “Emil Nolde – a German legend. The artist during the Third Reich” at Hamburger Bahnhof, which the course convenor co-curated.
Syllabus
FA106 Introduction to Photography and the Analogue Darkroom
Module: Artistic Practice
Instructor: hannah goldstein
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 9:00-12:15
This beginners’ introduction course teaches the foundation of analogue black and white photography in and out of the darkroom. You will learn how the camera works, how to manually develop film and how to print in the dark room. There will be weekly assignments and lectures on the history of photography, as well as presentations of contemporary photography. During the first half of the semester class time will be devoted to working in the darkroom and learning how to make a perfect print. The second half will focus on picture content, as a major part of the course is based on class discussions and learning to read and understand your images. In the second half of the course the students will work on a personal project. We will also make studio visits to Berlin based artists and exhibitions.
Syllabus
AR204 Art and Interpretation
Module: Art Objects and Experience / Approaching Arts Through Theory
Instructor: Geoff Lehman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 9:00-10:30 & Fri 9:00-12:15
Describing a painting, the art historian Leo Steinberg wrote: “The picture conducts itself the way a vital presence behaves. It creates an encounter.” In this course, we will encounter works of art to explore the specific dialogue each creates with a viewer and the range of interpretive possibilities it offers. More specifically, the course will examine various interpretive approaches to art, including formal analysis, iconography, social and historical contextualism, aestheticism, phenomenology, and psychoanalysis. Most importantly, we will engage interpretation in ways that are significant both within art historical discourse and in addressing larger questions of human experience and (self-)knowledge, considering the dialogue with the artwork in its affective (emotional) as well as its intellectual aspects. The course will be guided throughout by sustained discussion of a small number of individual artworks, with a focus on pictorial representation (painting, drawing, photography), although sculpture and installation art will also be considered. We will look at works from a range of different cultural traditions, and among the artists we will focus on are Xia Gui, Giorgione, Bruegel, Mirza Ali, Velázquez, Hokusai, Manet, Picasso, Man Ray, Martin, and Sherman. Readings will focus on texts in art history and theory but also include philosophical and psychoanalytic texts (Pater, Wölfflin, Freud, Merleau-Ponty, Barthes, Clark, and Krauss, among others). Visits to Berlin museums to experience works of art firsthand are an integral part of the course.
Syllabus
AH211 Introduction to Twentieth-Century Art: From Van Gogh’s Starry Night to Jeff Koons’ Made in Heaven
Module: Art and Artists in Context
Instructor: Laura López Paniagua
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 9:00-12:15
Around 1890, Vincent van Gogh painted his popular Starry Night (1890) and Bedroom in Arles (1888). A century later, Damien Hirst encased a shark in formaldehyde and displayed it as an artwork titled The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living (1991). In the same decade, Tracey Emin won the prestigious Turner Prize showing her own dirty bed (My Bed, 1998) and Jeff Koons produced sculptures and prints portraying himself and his then-wife, the former porn actress Ilona Staller (also known as Cicciolina), engaged in erotic acts in the series Made in Heaven (1989-1991). What happened in one century to transform art so radically? This course will examine the political and technological transformations—catastrophic, neutral, or beneficial—that precipitated alterations in views of representation and of the status of art itself. In our survey, we see the value of figurative realism interrogated and undermined by a myriad of different approaches. Dadaism, Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, Viennese Actionism, Minimalism, Conceptual Art and the relation of each to contextual pressures will all be addressed in our question concerning the fate of art in the twentieth century.
Syllabus
TH140 Practices of Making in the Performing Arts
Module: Artistic Practice/Approaching Arts Through Theory
Instructor: Eva Meyer-Keller, Ilya Noé
Credits: 8 ECTS 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 14:00-17:15
This course will centre around learning about, experimenting with, and reflecting on different modes of production and presentation in the field of contemporary performance. It will be divided in two halves: the first will introduce students to the history and theory of performance starting at the beginning of last century with Futurism, Dadaism and Bauhaus, and bringing it all the way to contemporary makers whose dance and post-dramatic work we will have a chance to experience live in Berlin. In addition to becoming acquainted with the particular approaches of the Stituationists, Land Artists, Fluxus, as well as artists like Allan Kaprow, Yves Klein, Martha Rosler, Joseph Beuys, Simone Forti, Bobby Baker, Francis Alys and Hito Steyerl among many others, students will also get to experiment with a working method that emphasises feedback sessions based on observations and associations rather than judgements and evaluations. During the second section, attention will zoom into each student’s individual projects which will be driven by their own personal interests and urgencies. These can originate from any kind of material from any sphere, such as autobiography, politics, natural and social sciences, etc., or emerge in response to any of the art works shown in class, including those made by fellow classmates. Students will be required to keep a process journal where to gather material and document their engagement with their own as well as other people’s work, so as to be able to find connections and identify areas to further investigate and develop. The course is open to students of all walks and levels. No previous experience is necessary
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Literature and Rhetoric:
TH207 Intensifying Reality: A Survey and Staging of 21st Century German Drama
Module: Approaching Arts Through Theory
Instructor: Julia Hart
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 15:45-19:00
German dramatists in the 21st Century have been developing new methods of ordering and processing verbal material for the stage. Some writers, like Fritz Kater, are said to create a special kind of compression, an intensification of reality. Other dramatists, like Elfriede Jelinek, use of polyphonic voice to attack the inhuman asylum policy of affluent European countries. This course will examine some of the most significant German plays from 2000- present. We will be discussing the dramaturgy of these sometimes shocking plays as well as exploring methods of staging these works in translation. We will be reading and rehearsing plays by writers in translation including: Dea Loher, Falk Richter, Marius von Mayenburg, Anja Hilling, Darja Stocker, and Ewald Palmetshofer. Students will work as directors, actors and dramaturges throughout the semester and will be introduced to practical rehearsal methods as students stage scenes from these authors. Questions we will be wrestling with include: What are the issues that German dramatists are addressing and how do these issues relate to our lives in 2019? How can these plays, that experiment radically with theatrical form and language, be staged?
Syllabus
FM201 Introduction to Film Studies: German Cinema
Module: Approaching Arts Through Theory
Instructor: Matthias Hurst
Credits: 8 ECTS 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30; weekly film screening Tue 19:30-22:00
In this introductory class basic knowledge of film history and theory, film aesthetics and cinematic language will be provided; central topics are the characteristics of film as visual form of representation, the development of film language since the beginning of the twentieth century, styles of filmic discourse, film analysis and different approaches to film interpretation. The thematic focus will be on German cinema with classical films by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau, Fritz Lang, Leni Riefenstahl, Volker Schlöndorff, Werner Herzog, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Wim Wenders and Tom Tykwer (and others), reflecting historical and cultural experiences and changes in German history and society as well as developments in aesthetics and cinematic style.
Syllabus
Economics Foundational Modules
EC110 Principles of Economics
Module: Principles of Economics
Instructor: Marcus Giamattei
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Thu 15:45-17:15
This course is an introduction to the essential ideas of economic analysis. It elaborates the basic model of consumer and firm behavior, including demand and supply, in the context of an idealized competitive market, and examines several ways in which the real world deviates from this model, including monopoly, minimum wages and other price controls, taxes, and government regulation. The assumptions concerning human behavior that underlie economics are presented and critiqued. The course is also concerned with the aggregate behavior of modern economies: growth and measurement of the economy, unemployment, interest rates, inflation, government spending and its impact, and international trade. Part of the course focuses on the government tools used to influence economic growth and individuals' behavior.
Syllabus
MA120 Mathematics for Economics
Module: Mathematics for Economics
Instructor: Marcus Giamattei
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 10:45-12:15
This course focuses on the mathematical tools important for the study of economics: analytic geometry, functions of a single variable, functions of two variables, calculus, integrals and linear algebra (matrices, determinants, systems of linear equations and methods for solving them). A large part of the course will deal with optimization in one or more variables and its corresponding applications in economics (e.g. utility and profit maximization problems). The course will also be of interest for any student with a general interest in mathematics, or who does not intend advanced specialization in economics, but wishes to become informed regarding the essential mathematical building blocks of economics as a discipline.
This course fulfills the mathematics and science requirement for humanities students
Syllabus
EC210 Microeconomics
Module: Microeconomics for Social Sciences
Instructor: Israel Waichman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 9:00-10:30
Microeconomics is the study of how individual economic units (households and firms) interact to determine outcomes (allocation of goods and services) in a market setting. This course further develops principles and analytical methods introduced by the Principles of Economics course. The first part of the course deals with consumer behavior, market demand and the extent to which a consumer’s decisions can be modeled as rational. The second part of the course deals with the theory of the firm and the positive and normative characteristics of alternative market structures—perfect competition, monopolistic competition, oligopoly, pure monopoly, and, in resource markets, monopsony—are studied in depth. Finally, the efficiency of market outcomes is studied as well as conditions (e.g. the presence of externalities) under which markets are not efficient. Part of the course is devoted to problem solving, in which students present solutions to specific case studies.
Syllabus
Ethics and Politics Foundational Modules
SO103 Representing the Other: Anthropological Research Methods and their Implications
Module: Methods in Social and Historical Studies
Instructor: Regina Knapp
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 9:00-10:30
This course engages with the methodological approaches of anthropological research and has a specific focus on visual anthropology and ethnographic filmmaking. It touches on anthropological debates on the (re)presentation of the “Other,” intercultural collaboration processes in research, and questions of perspectives. It introduces the tools we can use to examine the dynamics of a social context: the means by which we can gather information about it, interpret that information, and produce an understanding of the arrangement of social and cultural interaction. The course consists of a theoretical and a practical part. In the theoretical part, we will engage with literature on anthropological research and research methods. In most sessions, an ethnographic film will be screened, contextualised and discussed. In the practical part, we will select an anthropological research topic from our own social context. Based on this idea, participants develop and pursue their ethnographic research project and present it at the end of the class.
Syllabus
HI146 Migration History in Germany
Module: Methods in Social and Historical Studies
Instructor: Marion Detjen
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 9:00-12:15
This course is an introduction to twentieth- and twenty-first-century migration history in Germany, which was, in spite of constant migration movements, for a long time widely neglected by German historiography. We will seek to understand why Germany found it so difficult to conceive of itself as an immigration country and what kind of migration regimes it developed after the Second World War, under the conditions of German separation and reunification and in a European and global context. This will lead us to ask broader questions about how history is being written and what aims and interests it serves. How do personal and collective experience shape historical knowledge, and what is the relationship between politics and history? How many narratives can be formed out of one basic chronology, and how do we find the appropriate categories for analysing and interpreting our source material? What tools do we need to critically assess a source? The sources are not restricted to written documents, as we will use the city of Berlin with its rich landscape of memorials and museums as our material and hear the testimony of contemporary witnesses.
Syllabus
The following course is cross-listed with Literature and Rhetoric
LT145 Tragedy
Module: Ethics and Moral Philosophy
Instructor: David Hayes
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 17:30-19:00
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Politics
PT160 Feminism Is For Everybody
Module: History of Political Thought
Instructor: Agata Lisiak
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 9:00-10:30
Named after bell hooks’ 2000 essay collection, this course offers an introduction to feminism as a political movement. Exploring feminist theories and feminist methodologies, students will apply them to explore a range of historical and contemporary case studies, as well as engage critically with selected works of fiction, film, and visual art. Bringing together feminist contributions rooted in political science, sociology, cultural studies, art history, and literary criticism, the course will also act as an introduction to the work of such fascinating thinkers and activists as Silvia Federici, Sara Ahmed, Audre Lorde, Alexandra Kollontai, Clara Zetkin, Angela Davis, Chandra Talpade Mohanty, Angela McRobbie, Nawal El Saadawi, Akwugo Emejulu, Judith Butler, Griselda Pollock, and Laura Mulvey, among many others. Aside from seminar-style discussions, the course will feature guest lectures and off-campus visits.
Syllabus
PT130 Introduction to Political Theory: Plural Action
Module: History of Political Thought
Instructor: Jeffrey Champlin
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 14:00-17:15
The history of political theory projects not just ideal images of state sovereignty, but also versions of the subject that correspond to its construction of power in each case. Following the golden age of Greek thought, the modern emphasis on the individual in this tradition leads to continued conflicts between private reflection as a means of overcoming common prejudices and the need to find meaning in a common world. Through this lens, this class asks what kind of class, party, plurality, or multitude can make a difference in the view of such thinkers as Aristotle, Hobbes, Rousseau, Kant, Marx, Arendt, Butler, and Hardt and Negri. Throughout, we will ask how challenges to representative government and ideals of active citizenship help examine, and perhaps transform, difficulties of political agency today.
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PL208 Introduction to Existentialism
Module: Ethics and Moral Philosophy
Instructor: Tracy Colony
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 17:30-19:00
One of the most important philosophical movements of the 20th century is unquestionably Existentialism. The philosophy of existence developed by Jean-Paul Sartre can be seen as the clearest expression of this movement. In this course we will read selections from Sartre and other core representatives of French Existentialism. However, this reading will be prepared for by tracing through important philosophical lines of influence which the existentialists often acknowledged in the works of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Heidegger. All texts will be read in translation, however, parallel readings in the original French or German will be supported and encouraged.
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PL105 Introduction to Ethics
Module: Ethics and Moral Philosophy
Instructor: Thomas Hilgers
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 US credits
Course Times: Thu 15:45-19:00
What does it mean to lead a good life? What makes a person – or rather her character – good or bad? What makes a particular action good or bad? Can we universally determine what to do in general, and what not to do in general? Is it, for instance, always wrong for a person to kill, to steal, or to lie – and if so, how could we justify such universal rules or laws? What is the nature of evil? What is the nature of morality? These are some of the most fundamental questions asked in the field of philosophical ethics. In this course, we will address all of these questions by studying and discussing some of the most influential texts within the history of Western philosophy. More precisely, we will read and discuss famous texts by Aristotle, Aquinas, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, Arthur Schopenhauer, Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Nietzsche, Philippa Foot, John Rawls, Bernard Williams, and Cora Diamond.
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SC203 Bioethics and Biosciences
Module: Ethics and Moral Philosophy
Instructor: Ian Lawson
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 9:00-10:30
Traditional ethics considers the question of the good life. This course asks what life itself is. And how is its end, death, defined? What about the qualities of life: what are health, disability, gender or addiction? What distinguishes human from animal or plant life? We will concentrate on the practical ethical aspects of these questions raised by technologies such as genetic manipulation and practices such as factory farming, informed by contemporary ideas in the biological sciences. An underlying concern is the ways in which scientific theories and technologies do or should inform our behaviour. Conversely, we will explore the extent to which scientific theories of the nature of morality itself can (or should) do the same. Readings will not focus on traditional ethical theory but rather be drawn from bio- and medical ethics, cognitive psychology, the sociology of science and technology, and posthumanist discourse to create an eclectic syllabus based around four main topics: the moral sense, health, animals, and the law.
This course fulfills the mathematics and science requirement for humanities students.
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PT150 Global Citizenship
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Ramona Mosse
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
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PS119 Nation States and Democracy
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Boris Vormann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
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PS120 Introduction to Comparative Politics of the Middle East
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Hanan Toukan
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
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PS128 Introduction to Comparative Politics
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Tamara Kolarić
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
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IN110 Globalization and International Relations
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Boris Vormann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 17:30-19:00
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PS185 Introduction to Policy Analysis
Module: Political Systems and Structures
Instructor: Daniela Crăciun
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 17:30-19:00
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Literature and Rhetoric Foundational Modules
LT142 Fiction Writing Workshop
Module: Written Arts
Instructor: Clare Wigfall
Credits 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 12:30-15:45
British Faber & Faber author and BBC National Short Story Award winner Clare Wigfall offers a fiction writing workshop that guarantees to inspire your imagination. Whether you are an experienced writer or a total beginner, her intention is to break down the barriers that inhibit, so that the creative process can come naturally. You’ll be challenged to experiment with new writing techniques and different genres, such as dystopian fiction and writing in a historical context, as well as exploring how to mine your own experience for inspiration. You’ll also be introduced to inspirational and thought-provoking fiction by established authors, from Roxane Gay to Vladimir Nabokov, and will have a chance to hone your critical skills through discussion of these texts. Encouragement and guidance will be given to help you with shaping your ideas into fully developed writing, and of course you’ll gain invaluable feedback from the group through sharing your work in class. This course will work you hard and provide challenges and surprises, but it also promises lots of laughter, as well as much stimulation and encouragement from the others in the group.
Syllabus
LT143 Close Reading, Ethics, and the Novel
Module: Close Reading
Instructor: James Harker
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 17:30-19:00
In an era when the study of the humanities is under threat and the very activity of reading is seemingly in decline, a great many arguments have been put forth that literature is not just beneficial, it is ethical. But are these claims true? And where do they come from? This course is structured around three related questions and the dominant arguments that seek to answer them. Focusing on fiction, we will consider how we should read, and the hypothesis that “close reading” enhances fundamental skills in critical thinking. In addition to learning about what “close reading” is (or was) we will look at recent alternatives including “distant reading” and “surface reading.” We will turn to the question of what we read and the claims for and against the literary canon and the idea of virtue in literature. Finally, we will ask why we read and consider the “empathy hypothesis,” which suggests that reading fiction improves our ability to appreciate the different experiences of others. Our exploration of the ethical claim for fiction will be complemented by reading novels that provoke striking ethical questions for both their protagonists and their readers.
Syllabus
LT144 Theory of the Lyric
Module: Close Reading
Instructor: Francesco Giusti
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 15:45-17:15
What is a lyric poem? How does the lyric work? This course introduces students to the history and theory of the lyric as a literary genre in the European tradition from Ancient Greece to the current era. Poems from other traditions across world literature will also be discussed in order to trace connections, similarities, and variations. Through a journey across European poetry (in English translation) from Sappho and Catullus, through Dante, Petrarch, Pierre de Ronsard, John Keats and Rainer Maria Rilke, up to Wallace Stevens and Seamus Heaney, the course will also expose students to different theoretical approaches to the lyric and familiarize them with the current debates on the topic (Jonathan Culler’s transhistoricism, Virginia Jackson’s historicism, Jahan Ramazani’s transnationalism). Pairs of poems will be discussed in class together with articles or book excerpts representative of specific critical approaches. By confronting their close readings of selected poems with diverse theoretical perspectives, students will learn to analyze lyric poems from different epochs both in their context of production and in their long-term reception. Poems will be understood as instances of a particular discursive mode, as cultural objects that require a certain way of experiencing them, and as words available for repetition in different historical contexts and with different meanings.
Syllabus
LT118 Introduction to Critical and Cultural Theory
Module: Critical and Cultural Theory
Instructor: Laura Scuriatti
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 15:45-17:15
Throughout the modern history of literature and art, we encounter the demand that it be an imaginative locus of social justice, explaining, criticizing, and proposing alternatives to a deficient present. In this course, we will explore a number of texts and theories which analyse, diagnose and offer guidelines for the role of literature in modern Western societies. Although most of these texts can be said to propose sociological theories of literature (and the arts), most of the authors we will read were not professional sociologists, but rather philosophers, intellectuals and literary critics, also reflecting on their own role within the systems which had created a special space and status for this particular cultural formation. We will read texts by, among others, Georg Lukács, T.W. Adorno, Arnold Hauser, Jürgen Habermas, Marshall Berman, Raymond Williams, Peter Bürger, Antonio Gramsci, Julia Kristeva, Pierre Bourdieu, Gayatri C. Spivak, Franco Moretti, Lucien Goldmann, Robert Escarpit, Pascale Casanova.
Syllabus
The following course is cross-listed with Ethics and Politics:
LT145 Tragedy
Module: Close Reading
Instructor: David Hayes
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 17:30-19:00
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Art and Aesthetics:
TH207 Intensifying Reality: A Survey and Staging of 21st Century German Drama
Module: Literary History
Instructor: Julia Hart
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 15:45-19:00
Syllabus
FM201 Introduction to Film Studies: German Cinema
Module: Critical and Cultural Theory
Instructor: Matthias Hurst
Credits: 8 ECTS 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30; weekly film screening Tue 19:30-22:00
Syllabus
Politics Foundational Modules
PT150 Global Citizenship
Module: International Studies and Globalization
Instructor: Ramona Mosse
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
Citizenship is traditionally a concept associated with nation-states, and at base signifies the status of belonging to a bounded political order and the rights and duties this entails. Yet economic, legal and technological globalization increasingly calls state boundaries into question, and borderless problems such as climate change, forced migration, epidemics, weapons of mass destruction, and terrorism require collective action on an equally global scale. In this context, global citizenship has been promoted as a sensibility and indeed as an emerging reality. This course explores the notion of “global citizenship” from the philosophical, cultural, and political perspectives and challenges students to think critically about what global citizenship can and should mean. We will explore the history of this concept, with its roots in ancient philosophy as well as in modern definitions of national borders and processes of globalization; critiques of it; and contemporary experiences and movements through which it might be forged. The heart of the course will be in an interdisciplinary exploration of two of the borderless problems already noted above—climate change and forced migration—through readings and discussion of novels, film, social theory, social scientific research, and policy documents from international institutions like the UN. Texts will include essays by Kant, Martha Nussbaum and Craig Calhoun, Amitav Ghosh's The Shadow Lines, Ghassan Kanafani's Men in the Sun, Barbara Kingsolver's Flight Behavior and Michael Winterbottom's In This World. An important part of the course will be exchange between students enrolling in this course in different locations across the Bard network (USA, Russia, Lithuania, Palestine, Kyrgyzstan).
Syllabus
PS119 Nation States and Democracy
Module: Comparative Politics
Instructor: Boris Vormann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
Why and how do political systems differ from one another? Which processes have led to the formation of distinct political regimes? And how do these historical variations affect politics today? In addressing these questions in a wide set of contexts, this course provides an introduction to key theoretical approaches and concepts in the comparative study of politics. The focus will be on core topics in political development such as state and nation building, the role of the state in the economy, its relationship to civil society and processes of democratization. We will also look at different types of political regimes, electoral and party systems—and the ways in which they affect the structure, functioning, and social role of political institutions. We explore these topics from a comparative perspective in combining theoretical texts with case studies. By the end of the course, students will be able to understand important topics in domestic politics, grasp the diversity of political systems and regimes, and analyze current political developments.
Syllabus
PS120 Introduction to Comparative Politics of the Middle East
Module: Comparative Politics
Instructor: Hanan Toukan
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
This course offers students the opportunity to engage with and think about some of the most pertinent questions and fundamental debates in the study of the politics and societies of the modern Middle East. The course has two central aims. The first is to encourage students to question the epistemological foundations of the study of the region so they learn to critically question the context in which the scholarly body of knowledge about it has been constructed and produced. The second aim of the course is to contextualize the region’s modern history and politics within wider scholarly debates in comparative politics, international politics and area studies. The course is thematic rather than chronological and will cover weekly topics such as colonialism and decolonization, the authoritarian state, nationalism(s) and other ideologies, the politics of gender and sexuality and the politics of culture, the military, oil wars, states of security and the “global war on terror”, migration and displacement, revolutions, uprisings and mass mobilizations. Countries studied will include Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Palestine/Israel, Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon, Syria and the Gulf States.
Syllabus
PS128 Introduction to Comparative Politics
Module: Comparative Politics
Instructor: Tamara Kolarić
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
The course is designed to provide an introduction to comparative politics, a discipline of political science dealing with internal political structures, actors and processes and their interactions. We will focus on understanding the approaches of comparative politics as an (empirical) subfield, its epistemology and evolution (briefly in the first part of the course); as well as on covering some of the main topics in comparative politics (in the second part of the course). These will include conceptualizing the state and the processes of state- and nation-building (including questions of legitimacy and identity); different types of political regimes; democratization and the process of transition (its underlying drivers, stabilizers and backsliding tendencies, including actors - such as media – who can assist or hinder the process); different electoral and party systems; as well as processes beyond the state, such as globalization, which pose both an opportunity and a challenge to the contemporary political systems. By the end of the course, students will be familiar with the central topics, theories and concepts in comparative politics, and will be able to use them to analyze current political developments, as well as critically engage with the literature in the subfield.
Syllabus
IN110 Globalization and International Relations
Module: International Studies and Globalization
Instructor: Boris Vormann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 17:30-19:00
In the social sciences, globalization is often defined as an increase in the mobility of various factors and actors. This definition includes heightened flows of finance capital, the rise of global production networks in expanding divisions of labor as well as the movement of people and ideas. This course uses standard international relations theories as a starting point to examine how growing networks of exchange and circulation have altered political calculation, economic geographies, and governmental arrangements. A particular focus will be placed on the political processes that have facilitated and increased mobility over time, from the emergence of the interstate system in the late nineteenth century, to the globalization of trade and interdependence in our own historical moment. We will explore new actor constellations and shifting power arrangements in more detail with regards to transnational environmental issues, asymmetric warfare, and humanitarian interventions. In so doing, we consider the ways in which the phenomena and levels of globalization challenge the traditional paradigms of the social sciences and prompt a new formulation of the field of international relations.
Syllabus
PS185 Introduction to Policy Analysis
Module: Policy Analysis
Instructor: Daniela Crăciun
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 17:30-19:00
This course will introduce students to the definition of policy problems, the identification of alternative solutions to these, and the criteria governing the choice between these alternatives. Students are exposed to the various sources of evidence upon which assessment of alternatives is carried out as well as to the basis for considering policy impact. Through case studies, presentations and reviews of professionally-conducted policy analyses, students will receive a first-hand exposure to both the basic steps of this undertaking, and will have an opportunity to critique real-world policy decisions. Cases for analysis will include government policies on aging populations and social policies relating to housing and community development. The course will involve both individual and team work. Key outcomes will include an introductory knowledge of policy analysis, an ability to engage with policy problems and decide on the best policy solution. The courses fosters an ability to articulate policy recommendations both verbally and in writing.
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Ethics and Politics:
PT160 Feminism Is For Everybody
Module: Political and Moral Thought
Instructor: Agata Lisiak
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 9:00-10:30
Syllabus
PT130 Introduction to Political Theory: Plural Action
Module: Political and Moral Thought
Instructor: Jeffrey Champlin
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 14:00-17:15
Syllabus
PL208 Introduction to Existentialism
Module: Political and Moral Thought
Instructor: Tracy Colony
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 17:30-19:00
Syllabus
PL105 Introduction to Ethics
Module: Political and Moral Thought
Instructor: Thomas Hilgers
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 US credits
Course Times: Thu 15:45-19:00
Syllabus
Art and Aesthetics Advanced Modules
FA302 Advanced Painting: Oil Paint and After
Module: Media, Practices, Techniques
Instructor: John Kleckner
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Fri 9:00-12:15
This advanced studio course is designed to connect the gamut of materials and techniques in contemporary painting with the development of an individual aesthetic style. Weekly sessions will expose students to a wide range of experimental paint applications with the aim of synchronizing chosen materials and methods with personal expression and content. Classes will feature demonstrations of techniques such as airbrushing, marbling, masking, projecting, stamping, stencils, collage, and inkjet printing on canvas. Students will gain experience working with oil, acrylic, enamel, vinyl, and gouache paints. Material demonstrations will be augmented by readings, slideshows, gallery tours, and studio visits. The syllabus begins with directed assignments that become increasingly more personalized and independent as the course progresses. The ideal student will have previous painting experience and be highly motivated to make a body of original work. The semester culminates in an “Open Studios” group exhibition.
Syllabus
TH309 Creating and Theorizing Contemporary Performing Arts in Berlin
Module: Media, Practices, Techniques / Artists, Genres, Movements / Exhibition Culture and Public Space
Instructor: Nina Tecklenburg
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 9:00-12:15
Let’s dive into Berlin’s performing arts world. This course provides an intensive practical and theoretical engagement with current theater and performance productions, artists and different institutions from municipal theaters (“Stadttheater”) such as the Volksbühne, Schaubühne, Deutsches Theater, Berliner Ensemble, Maxim Gorki Theater to independent venues like Hebbel am Ufer, Sophiensaele, Ballhaus Ost, and the English Theatre Berlin. The course involves regular theater visits along with meeting and interviewing theater artists. We will study different working conditions, artistic approaches as well as the techniques used to create “creative responses” on stage and on paper. We will practice different modes of performance analysis and read core texts of performance theory (Richard Schechner, Hans-Thies Lehmann, Peggy Phelan, Erika Fischer-Lichte, Philip Auslander, and Rebecca Schneider) and relate them critically to the works we see. We will see works by famous Berlin-based theater, dance and performance makers such as She She Pop, Frank Castorf, Rimini Protokoll, Thomas Ostermeier, Gob Squad, Sasha Waltz as well as pieces by less well-known artists. The final list of productions we will study will be announced at the beginning of the course when the theaters publish their upcoming programs.
Syllabus
FA308 Finding the Stories
Module: Media, Practices, Techniques
Instructor: Carla Åhlander
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 9:00-12:15
This course combines photo analysis and practical photo work. Consciousness will be raised of what a narrative constitutes and how the meaning of a photograph is created. In addition to producing their own photo series, the participants will become skilled at looking at, reading and talking about photographs. We will deal with issues such as subjectivity and objectivity, private and public, as well as technical issues like light situations. The workshop will include collaborations between students together we will explore a variety of aesthetic, practical and conceptual issues, asking questions like "What is my attitude to the topic?" or "Where does this narrative begin or end?"
Syllabus
FA309 Berlin: Responding to the City
Module: Media, Practices, Techniques
Instructor: Louis Cameron
Credits: 8 ECTS , 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 9:00-12:15
The city of Berlin will be the subject of this studio course. Drawing from personal encounters with the city and their own research, students produce site specific/responsive projects, or a series of works, that addresses the city's history, culture, environment, or other aspects of its reality. Each student will develop an independent project working in any medium they choose including photography, sculpture, painting, film/video, performance or other arts. The class incorporates forums and activities that help contextualize the projects: lectures, studio visits, viewing exhibitions, critiques, and readings. The beginning of the class will involve exposure to precedent-setting examples of artists engaging with their cities. Participants will also maintain a photographic "journal" to keep track of their thoughts throughout the process. Once a direction is established, each project will be developed with input from the instructor, classmates, and others. By the end of the semester students will have completed works that present their specific response to the city of Berlin.
Syllabus
FM320 Embodied Video: A Process in Somatic Autobiography and Performance
Module: Media, Practices, Techniques
Instructor: Dafna Maimon
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 17:30-20:45
This advanced video class will explore the ways in which autobiography, as experienced through the body, can function as a performative and radical tool for making video art. By placing the body in the foreground as subject, we will unravel new approaches to addressing empathy, memories, feelings, sensations, and options for action in contemporary life. In doing so, we will delve deeply into the intelligence of the body, its capacity to store and process information, as well as express it. We will relate to the filmed medium as an extension of our senses, and to the body itself as a stage for an emotional landscape that can be both personal and political at once. Experiments with different self-empowering movement techniques such as Body Mind Centering, Authentic Movement, Improvisation, scoring-systems, and drawing will be at the center of our curriculum. These methods will help us gain somatic awareness and creativity, as well as a sensitivity for time and space, the two major elements we need to learn to control as video artists. Prepare to move, play, and perform utilizing your own body as material and subject within on-site class workshops; extreme curiosity, group participation and open-mindedness will be expected. Students applying for this course should already have ample experience in filming and be self-sufficient in editing (Adobe Premiere Pro CC, or other equivalent programs). Alongside our own experimentations, we will analyze works from artists who work with the body and performance as their starting point. Likewise, visiting somatic practitioners will be invited to host workshops within the class. The focus of this course will not be on technical video instruction. Instead, students will develop a rigorous and unique conceptual and visual language that can at once analyze, criticize, and transmit visceral embodied experiences reflecting on our physical existence and potential as humans in this highly digital age.
Syllabus
AH302 The Idea of the Aesthetic
Module: Aesthetics and Art Theory
Instructor: Katalin Makkai
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 15:45-17:15
“Aesthetics” and “aesthetic” are terms that are often taken for granted inside as well as outside academic discourse. We speak of aesthetic experiences and judgments and qualities, and we employ “aesthetics” to designate the study of such matters. Although their root is taken from the Greek, the now-familiar terms (in their now-familiar usages) are, however, comparatively new. They are commonly regarded as having been introduced into the philosophical lexicon in the eighteenth century—a few hundred years ago. This course studies some of the texts that were key to the discovery, or perhaps the invention, of the “aesthetic”. What work was the idea meant to do? How did its evolution retain or reconfigure its original senses and purposes? Is the idea of the aesthetic problematic, ideological, or chimerical? Do we need such an idea to think about nature and our relation to it? Authors addressed include Shaftesbury, Hutcheson, Hume, Kant, Schiller, Schopenhauer, Coleridge, Bell, Beardsley, Bullough, Stolnitz, Isenberg, Dickie, Greenberg, Carroll, Bernstein, Rancière. Do we need an idea of the aesthetic to think about art? Authors include Plato, Kant, Schopenhauer, Clive Bell, George Dickie, Clement Greenberg, Susan Sontag, Danto, Adorno, Terry Eagleton, Rancière.
Syllabus
AR360 Practices and Politics of Contemporary Art: the Venice Biennial 2019
Module: Exhibition Culture and Public Space/Aesthetics and Art Theory
Instructor: Dorothea von Hantelmann
Credits: 8 ECTS , 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 14:00-17:15
The highlight of this course is a trip to Venice, to the 2019 edition of the Venice Biennial, which we will visit together. Founded in 1895, the Biennale di Venezia is the oldest world exhibition of visual art, and it figures as a model (and counter-model) for many of the 200 international periodic exhibitions that exist today. The excursion to Venice will be supplemented by pre- and post-sessions in Berlin, in which we will practice close-readings of contemporary art objects and images, gestures and situations. We will analyze how artworks reflect upon precarious aspects of existence today, discuss different views on art’s social and political function, and relate artworks to selected theoretical concepts such as Edouard Glissant’s mondialité and the discourse of the Anthropocene.
Students interested in registering for the course must provide a short letter of motivation that explains why they would like to take the course. Letters should be sent directly to [email protected].
Please note there is a fee of €350 for participation in this course to cover travel to and accommodation in Venice. The trip to Venice will take place during fall break.
Syllabus
The following course is cross-listed with Literature and Rhetoric
LT324 Modernism and the Interarts
Module: Aesthetics and Art Theory
Instructor: Ross Shields
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 15:45-19:00
Syllabus
Economics Advanced Modules
EC212 Experimental Economics
Modules: Behavioral Economics
Instructor: Israel Waichman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 14:00-17:15
Experimental economics is the application of experimental methods to the study of economic questions. Especially, experimental economics allows for the controlled study of markets, environments, and the behavior of participants. The course aims at introducing experimental economics and its various applications. Our inquiry consists of two parts. In the first part, “the methodology of experimental economics,” we introduce experimental economics. We discuss the merits (and limits) of experiments, and the principles of conducting and analyzing an experiment. In the second part, “Applications: Influential experiments in economics,” we survey some of the seminal research in experimental (and behavioral) economics (e.g. market experiments, bargaining experiments, biases and heuristics under uncertainty, field experiments, social dilemma experiments, etc.). During the course we will conduct some experiments in the classroom, providing the course participants with first-hand experience of the economic situations that are being described.
Pre-requisite: The course is non-technical and students from all disciplines are encouraged to participate. However, students taking this class must have successfully completed the course Principles of Economics.
Syllabus
EC310 Global Economics
Module: Global Economic Systems
Instructor: Behzad Azarhoushang
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Thu 17:30-19:00
Dealing with advanced topics of macroeconomics, such as trade and financial aspects of open economic systems, this course addresses real flows of goods in international trade as well as the flow of assets and liabilities in international financial markets. Key theories of trade are discussed and evaluated along with the role played by money, credit, and banking within modern economies. The module also looks at economic systems and the organization of economic life within these systems: what are the key features of global capitalism? To what extent is economic planning relegated to the state or the market and how are these two entities distinguished? How viable are these systems and what sorts of institutions do they create?
Syllabus
EC320 Econometrics
Module: Econometrics
Instructor: Israel Waichman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
Economics is in many ways an applied science deeply anchored in real-world phenomena that can be measured and quantified. In order to answer important quantitative questions, the economist needs to collect data and assess the empirical relationships between objects of interest. Since much economic data is observational, a main task of the econometrician is trying to find out whether events that are correlated also stand in causal relationship with each other and in what order of priority. In order to answer such questions, the economist needs the toolkit of multivariate regression analysis as well as a number of sophisticated techniques that expand on the simple linear regression model (time series and panel data models, vector-autoregressive models, non- and semiparametric econometric techniques, and various methods to assess the degree to which such models fit). This course expands on the basic statistics course by applying and developing core statistical notions within an economic context. It develops literacy in applied economics, and capacity to assess claims made in that field through critique of methods of econometric analysis.
Syllabus
Ethics and Politics Advanced Modules
The following course is cross-listed with Literature and Rhetoric
PT320 Discussing Deutschland: What Germans Are Talking About Today (in German)
Module: Law, Politics and Society / Civic Engagement and Social Justice
Instructor: Michael Thomas Taylor
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 15:45-17:15
This course examines the interconnections between today’s most pressing concerns in the German public discourse with organizations and institutions dedicated to actively intervening in and shaping social issues. We combine investigations of the crisis of democracy debates in German media and current research with visits to sites of civil society activism and community organizations as they have developed in past and present East and West Germany. And we engage with the topic of cultural pluralism in light of recent social, political, and religious tensions related to migration, not only in the seminar room but also through visits to local groups invested in contributing to resolving these tensions through various initiatives. Navigating a wide range of platforms for news and discussion, we look at how modern social media promotes civil movements from the political left and right, and ask what this pluralization of forms of communication means for Germany’s established public-media services. In addition to the study of current public debates and forms of civic engagement, the purpose of this course is to refine and advance your ability to articulate yourself verbally and in writing through constant vocabulary building. Students taking the class should have a B2 proficiency level.
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Politics
PT328 Dilemmas of Popular Sovereignty
Module: Law, Politics and Society / Global Social Theory
Instructor: Ewa Atanassow
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 10:45-12:15
Popular sovereignty – or the principle that authority must rest with the people – has been heralded as one of the preeminent ideas of modernity, and the paradigmatic way of legitimizing political power in the modern world. If over the course of the past two centuries a rising tide of nations committed themselves to the principles of popular sovereignty; in recent years, the soundness and viability of “rule of the people” has come into question. In this course, we will probe contemporary problems of democratic governance related to issues of popular legitimation by illuminating their historical roots and theoretical ramifications, and engaging with social scientific studies. The questions we will ask include: What does it mean for a people to be sovereign, and who can belong to a sovereign people? How and when do “the people” appear in political life, through what institutions or modes of representation? What is the social and cultural basis of popular sovereignty, and how does it evolve? Drawing on different modes of investigation, and comparing diverse historical and geopolitical perspectives, we will aim to gain a profound grasp of both current challenges and inherent dilemmas of liberal democracy. Our goal will be to develop a rich understanding of the idea and problematic of popular sovereignty; an ability to interrogate and interpret social scientific evidence; and an interest in extending this type of analytic endeavor to other topics.
Syllabus
SO330 Social Differentiation and Transmission of Religious Knowledge in the Hispanic World (14th-16th Centuries)
Module: Global Social Theory / Movements and Thinkers
Instructors: Dr. Mònica Colominas Aparicio, MPIWG, Department I, Research Scholar
Dr. Helge Wendt, MPIWG, Department I, Research Scholar
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 9:00-12:15
This course deals with the subject of social differentiation and the transmission of religious knowledge in multi-ethnic and multi-religious societies in the late medieval and early modern Hispanic World. We address a number of issues that help us understand the contours of the debate on the connection between knowledge and identity, such as: theoretical concepts to frame otherness, mechanisms for the transmission of knowledge, and the social composition in the Iberian Peninsula and Spanish colonies. We will: 1. Interrogate the socio-religious entities and their mutual relationships (Christians, Jews, Muslims in the Peninsula, and pre-Columbian religious communities and Christians in the colonial world), 2. Discuss the uses of bio-cultural ascriptions and external expressions of religion in the creation of categories of otherness: who is a new Christian? 3. Analyze key mechanisms in the transmission of religious knowledge (dialogue, polemics, conversion, suppression / expulsion): we are interested in knowing which are the functions and impact of these forms on society and how they reflect the contexts, 4. Assess the effects of religious knowledge (stabilization / destabilization): we want to look specifically at how new knowledge has led to new social configurations or stabilized existing structures. 5. Review the most relevant theoretical frameworks and concepts for the study of otherness and social differentiation in recent decades (hybridization, syncretism, métissage, coexistence, religious diversity, Convivencia).
The above course fulfills the science requirement for humanities students.
Syllabus
SO321 All that is Solid Melts into Air
Module: Global Social Theory / Movements and Thinkers
Instructor: Agata Lisiak
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
This class is dedicated to a careful reading of Marshall Berman’s All That Is Solid Melts Into Air – a highly influential, if not uncontroversial 1982 book on the experience of modernity. With this book, Berman aimed for nothing less than grasping "a world where everything is pregnant with its contrary" and we will attempt to do the same. We will read and discuss the authors Berman engages with (Goethe, Marx and Engels, Dostoyevsky, Baudelaire, Benjamin), as well as many others whose voices remain absent from his analysis, but need to be heard in the context of critical reflections on modernity. We will therefore discuss Berman’s western-centric study alongside texts that offer postcolonial, feminist, and queer approaches to modernity. Aside from Berlin, Paris, New York, and Saint Petersburg, presented as the modern metropolises in All That Is Solid, we will also discuss experiences of modernity in Mexico City, Taipei, Lagos, and Sao Paulo, among other cities. Drawing on works of fiction, film, ethnographic studies, essays, theory, and hip hop, we will reflect on how modern individuals assert their dignity in the city, even if it is exclusionary and oppressive. As Berman observes: "the streets, our streets, are where modernism belongs" – we will explore these streets not only through theory, but also on a series of walks in Berlin.
Syllabus
PL260 Freud and Psychoanalysis
Module: Movements and Thinkers
Instructor: Jan Völker
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 17:30-20:45
Freud and Freudianism are part of daily life, for instance in the concept of the “Freudian slip” and other revealing symptoms supposed to betray the operations of the unconscious in otherwise apparently rational discourse and action. Also considered characteristically “Freudian” is the assumption of the primacy of sexual desire in human motivation, particularly the desires rendered taboo by family and kinship structures, epitomized in Western culture in the story of Oedipus. These general conceptions linked with Freud derive from elements of his writings but are also sometimes distant from the complex development of the theory he founded, psychoanalysis, and its significance for theory and philosophy. This course traces the evolution of Freud’s practice and thought from the early engagement with the notion of the “talking cure,” explorations of individual case histories and the workings of dreams, to the elaboration of more ambitious accounts of the basis of human society, culture, and subjectivity. Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920) became the principal point of departure for later psychoanalysis, with its radical reformulation of the theory of the “drives,” and its insistence on the preeminence of repetition. Throughout, we will focus on specifying and understanding Freud’s fundamental concepts and the transformation of these, as well as the role of narrative or the very process of theorization itself in the establishment of his conclusions.
Syllabus
PS379 Comparative Politics of Gender and Family
Module: Global Social Theory
Instructor: Aysuda Köleman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 10:45-12:15
Syllabus
PT358 Critical Human Rights and Humanitarian Advocacy/ Scholars At Risk
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice / Law, Politics and Society
Instructor: Kerry Bystrom
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 15:45-17:15
Syllabus
SE222 Performing the Anthropocene
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice / Movements and Thinkers
Instructor: Ramona Mosse
Credits: 8 ECTS credits, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 14:00-17:15
Syllabus
SE223 Styles of Civic Engagement
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice / Movements and Thinkers
Instructor: Aaron Tugendhaft
Credits: 8 ECTS Credits, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 15:45-19:00
Syllabus
Literature and Rhetoric Advanced Modules
LT212 Reading into Writing: A Fiction Workshop
Module: Producing Literature
Instructor: Rebecca Rukeyser
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 15:45-19:00
This course is designed to develop and enhance your capacity for imagination, empathy, and clarity and originality of written expression via the writing and reading of short fiction. As a workshop, we will be focusing primarily on your short fiction, supplemented by contemporary and canonical readings.
Written requirements: You'll write two short fictional pieces, 1500 words minimum, due on a rotating schedule over the course of the semester. You'll also revise these pieces post-workshop, and will hand in the revised drafts along with a revision key that explains what changes were made (and why). In addition, you're required to write and overview of a literary journal and hand in short, 250-word workshop letters as part of the peer review process.
Participation requirements: Read all assigned works carefully and come to class prepared to discuss them in detail with regard to sentence structure, phrasing, narrative voice, images, dialogue, etc., and how these function as unifying elements. Participate in peer workshops, giving both encouragement and specific suggestion, as well as speaking about the larger goals of each piece. Give a ten-minute presentation on a work of fiction you recommend to your fellow workshoppers.
All reading material supplied, both in hard copy and PDF form.
Please note as this is an advanced course, enrollment in this class is subject to approval by the instructor. Please submit an example of your work to [email protected].
Syllabus
LT322 Der deutsche Literaturbetrieb [Introduction to the German Literary World]
Module: Producing Literature / Writer and World
Instructor: Martin Widmann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
This course introduces students to the German literary and publishing world which is currently undergoing significant changes. While traditionally operating within a realm defined by nationality and language, many German writers and publishers have recently begun to transcend such boundaries. In response to David Damrosch’s conception of world literature and what he calls the “true transnationalism of our national traditions,” and Pascale Casanova’s influential study The World Republic of Letters, students will explore some of the factors at work in the literary field. We will first assess the extent to which the international image of German literature is still defined by canonical male modernists such as Franz Kafka, Bertolt Brecht or Paul Celan, before identifying current trends and modes of writing. Connecting the past to the present, the course will further address questions regarding the contemporary German “Literaturbetrieb”: can creative writing be studied (or taught)? What role do journals and magazines play, both corporate and independent, in the literary scene? How do manuscripts get published and/or become books? What are the functions and effects of literary awards, fellowships etc.? How do translations and translators shape and expand the German literary market? And how do German writers and publishers respond to the challenges of the digital era? Classroom discussions will be supplemented by field trips to some established Berlin literary institutions such as Akademie der Künste, as well as to independent initiatives. In addition, we will be joined by “agents in the field” from the German literary world. Guests may include staff members from Literarisches Colloquium Berlin, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Deutsches Literaturinstitut Leipzig, Rowohlt Verlag, Internationales Literaturfestival Berlin (ilb), editors from the magazines EDIT and Merkur, as well as freelance translators and writers.
NB. All students should have B2 German proficiency. Requirements for assessed writing assignments and presentations will be adapted to the individual level proficiency.
Syllabus
LT323 African Narratives of Migration: from Colonialism to Globalization
Module: Literary Movements and Forms / Writer and World
Instructor: Fatin Abbas
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 14:00-17:15
This course examines African narratives of migration, exploring literary engagements beginning in the early/mid-20th century to the present day. The course will consider the ways in which African writers have inscribed the migrant experience in relation to the historical processes of colonialism and globalization. We will first examine the links between migration and colonialism in the early work of African writers such as Léopold Senghor, Tayeb Salih and Ama Ata Aidoo. We will then go on to consider new migrant literatures within the context of globalization, tracing how the theme of migration is revised and re-constituted under new global conditions (which nonetheless hark back to colonialism) in the texts of contemporary African writers such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Teju Cole, Dinaw Mengistu and Shailja Patel, among others. Finally, we will engage with and critically explore key concepts—such as “Pan-Africanism” and “Afropolitanism”—that are central to debates around contemporary African migration. The course will pay special attention to the ways in which gender, class, ethnicity and race inform representations of the African migrant experience in the works under consideration. By the end of the semester, students will have a deeper grasp of the constitution and evolution of this theme in the African literary canon, as well as related historical processes.
Syllabus
The following course is cross-listed with Art and Aesthetics
LT324 Modernism and the Interarts
Module/s: Theories of Literature and Culture / Writer and World
Instructor: Ross Shields
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 15:45-19:00
Aesthetic modernism is often theorized in terms of medial specificity: painting is said to be about the flatness of the canvas; music investigates the acoustic affinities among sounds; literature reflects on how texts produce meaning. Although there may be some truth to this thesis, which was formulated independently by Clemente Greenberg and Theodor Adorno, it fails to do justice to the interartistic tendency that characterizes much of aesthetic modernism in the early twentieth century. This course will reconsider the question of the interarts from the point of view of its modernist practitioners. On the one hand, we will examine the reflections of artists (in the broad sense) on mediums not their own—for example, Wassily Kandinsky on music, Gertrude Stein on painting, or Arnold Schönberg on literature—asking what the artistic 'other' allow them to articulate about their primary medium. On the other hand, we will consider interartistic journals and intermedial collaborations like Blast ( i.e., vorticism) and Der Blaue Reiter. We will ask: To what extent does interartistic reflection impact artistic production? How does the modernist stage production differ from the romantic Gesamtkunstwerk? To what extent does it anticipate the development of sound film? Finally, is it possible to reconcile interartistic collaboration with medial specificity?
Readings by Adorno, Dewey, Greenberg, Eisenstein, H.D., Kandinsky, Klee, Kulbin, Picasso, Pound, Schönberg, Stein, Valéry, Webern, etc.
Syllabus
The following course is cross-listed with Ethics and Politics:
PT320 Discussing Deutschland: What Germans Are Talking About Today (in German)
Module: Writer and World
Instructor: Michael Thomas Taylor
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 15:45-17:15
NB. Students taking the class should have B2 proficiency level in German.
Syllabus
The following courses are cross-listed with Politics:
SE222 Performing the Anthropocene
Module: Writer and World
Instructor: Ramona Mosse
Credits: 8 ECTS credits, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 14:00-17:15
Syllabus
PL260 Freud and Psychoanalysis
Module: Theories of Literature and Culture
Instructor: Jan Völker
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 17:30-20:45
Syllabus
Politics Advanced Modules
All courses are cross-listed with Ethics and Politics:
PS379 Comparative Politics of Gender and Family
Module: Public Policy / Advanced Topics in Global and Comparative Politics
Instructor: Aysuda Köleman
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 10:45-12:15
Decisions about marriage and divorce, the number of children we have, our career path, the choice between continuing paid employment or working as a full-time parent or caregiver, the amount of time we spend on work of whatever type, and even the type of parent we become are profoundly influenced by laws, regulations and policies. These shape the labor market and taxation levels, the education and health care systems as well determining degrees of economic inequality. The structure of the relationship between markets, governments, and individuals affects not only our work life or income but also influences our ideals of romance and happiness, our opinions on sexual orientation, the value we attribute to work and education, the effort we put into looking physically attractive, and our opinions on what and who makes a good parent. In this course, we compare how states around the world intervene in our family relationships and romantic lives, and shape gender roles. We examine the subtle nudges as well as strict laws that aim to push us into making decisions that the government prefers. We also inquire into the limits, blind spots and failures of gender- and family-related policies, their unintentional consequences and the social backlash they may provoke. While the course mainly focuses on advanced industrial countries, we will also study the politics of gender and family in industrializing nations.
Syllabus
PT358 Critical Human Rights and Humanitarian Advocacy/ Scholars At Risk
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice
Instructor: Kerry Bystrom
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 15:45-17:15
Scholars, students, and other researchers around the world are routinely threatened, jailed, or punished. Sometimes they are simply trapped in a dangerous place, while in other cases they are deliberately targeted because of their identity or their work. Academic freedom, or freedom of thought and inquiry, is usually considered a basic human right, but its definition and content is essentially contested. This seminar will explore the idea of academic freedom by examining - and attempting to intervene in - situations where it is threatened. In conjunction with the human rights organization Scholars at Risk, we will investigate the cases of scholars currently living under threat and develop projects aimed at releasing them from detention or securing refuge for them. This will involve direct hands-on advocacy work with SAR, taking public positions and creating smart and effective advocacy campaigns for specific endangered students, teachers, and researchers. In order not to do this naively or uncritically, our action-oriented work will be paired throughout the semester with critical reflection on human rights and humanitarian advocacy more generally. Through readings about the historical rise of human rights and humanitarianism as paradigms for creating a better world--as well as the pitfalls of these paradigms--and by engaging with texts that outline the ethical and practical challenges of doing advocacy, we will together work towards creating an intellectual framework that allows us to be more attentive, deliberate and effective advocates for social change.
Syllabus
SE223 Styles of Civic Engagement
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice
Instructor: Aaron Tugendhaft
Credits: 8 ECTS Credits, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 15:45-19:00
This course will explore the philosophical underpinnings and practical possibilities of being an engaged citizen. We will begin by studying classical arguments for and against the “vita activa” as well as consider the theological foundations for the commitment to social justice as presented by the Hebrew prophets. We will then consider the forms civic engagement can take within different regimes and what institutions are best for promoting an engaged citizenry (and whether this is in fact desirable). We will end with a handful of case studies. Readings will be drawn from such authors as Jane Addams, Hannah Arendt, Aristotle, Bertolt Brecht, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi, Václav Havel, Jeremiah, Niccolò Machiavelli, James Madison, Nelson Mandela, Rigoberta Menchú, Montesquieu, Martin Luther King, and Simone Weil. Certain assignments will be performed jointly with students on other Bard campuses.
Syllabus
SO330 Social Differentiation and Transmission of Religious Knowledge in the Hispanic World (14th-16th Centuries)
Module: Philosophy and Society
Instructors: Dr. Mònica Colominas Aparicio, MPIWG, Department I, Research Scholar
Dr. Helge Wendt, MPIWG, Department I, Research Scholar
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 9:00-12:15
Syllabus
SO321 All that is Solid Melts into Air
Module: Advanced Topics in Global and Comparative Politics / Philosophy and Society
Instructor: Agata Lisiak
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
Syllabus
The following courses are also cross-listed with Literature and Rhetoric:
SE222 Performing the Anthropocene
Module: Civic Engagement and Social Justice
Instructor: Ramona Mosse
Credits: 8 ECTS credits, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 14:00-17:15
This seminar will explore how the performing arts have engaged with ecological crisis, climate change and offer sites of intervention to reconfigure our social imaginaries in the age of the Anthropocene. How can theatre and performance stage the relationship between humans and nature or perform the non- and posthuman? How can performance find a way of allowing us to relate to abstract sets of scientific data and the often invisible relationships between globalisation and Climate Change? We will take a comparative approach by exploring the radically different formats theatre and performance makers around the world have found to explore life in the Anthropocene aesthetically, ranging from new playwriting to conceptual multi-media pieces, from applied theatre projects to political activism that focuses on the relationship between aesthetic and democratic representation. We will ask further how making theatre about the Anthropocene can have an impact on the current socio-political debates. The course includes work by contemporary playwrights such as Caryl Churchill, Ella Hickson, Clare Duffy, and Duncan MacMillan, by theatre makers such as Complicité, Rimini Protokoll, or the Philippine theater ensemble PETA, as well as organisations such as Climate Change Theatre Action and Theater Without Borders. The seminar will include a practical workshop that concludes in a scrap performance of a new short Climate Change play, part of the Climate Change Theatre Action Initiative 2019 that stages new plays around the world between September - December 2019.
Syllabus
PL260 Freud and Psychoanalysis
Module: Philosophy and Society
Instructor: Jan Völker
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue 17:30-20:45
Syllabus
Electives
PL150 Introduction to Symbolic Logic
Instructor: Robert Martin
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
An introduction to logic, requiring no prior knowledge of philosophy or mathematics. This course aims mainly at imparting the ability to recognize and construct correct formal deductions and refutations. Our text (available on-line free of charge) covers the first order predicate calculus with identity; we will cover as much of that as feasible in one semester. There is software for the course, called Logic 2010, developed by Robert Martin and David Kaplan at UCLA in the 1990s and subsequently rewritten for the internet, that will assist students by providing feedback on exercises.
This course fulfills the mathematics and science requirement for humanities students
Syllabus
MU150 Musical Performance
Instructor: Robert Martin
Credits: 4 ECTS, 2 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed 15:45-17:45
This course convenes once per week to give students who are dedicated to practicing a musical instrument the opportunity to perform works from their current repertoire. If students wish, weekly lessons can be organized for them in their chosen instrument with teachers outside Bard College Berlin. An additional 2 ECTS can be applied for on completion of a 14-week series of lessons.
Syllabus
TH181 The Synesthetic Voice
Instructor: Alessio Castellacci
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Thu 9:00-12:15
During this course you will be introduced to the field of vocal-physical performance, which exists in the interstitial space between the traditional definitions of theatre, dance, music. One of the main goal is to develop an investigative focus towards the subtleties of sound and motion, through practices of deep listening, impulse work, dynamic meditations, experiential anatomy, improvised singing, vocal instant composition and improvisation. More specifically, we will approach the voice and movement connection from two linked perspectives: the experience of sound as vibration, and how this can be perceived as a tactile input from the body; the practice of synesthetic perception as a unifying process of voice, mind and body, that we can tap in as a source for spontaneous imagery in improvised performance. In each class we will activate the body's perceptual intelligence through bio-energetic work, yoga of breath and somatic explorations.
Once we are aware of the fine levels of the body/voice connection, I will invite you to move on to a more intuitive and open level of improvisation. About synesthesia: a synesthetic experience happens every time an input gathered through one organ of perception triggers a sensorial impression in a different sense. We will practice opening up the possibilities of perception through different tasks (eye/ear sense deprivation, graphic voice response, Authentic Movement, Authentic Toning), finding your own flow and orientation in this augmented sensorial world. The synesthetic experience will invite us to shift into right brain functioning and intuitive choice making. At the end of each session we take time to practice improvised performance in different configurations, allowing inner impulses to manifest and articulate in the space, and to exchange verbal feedback in a supportive way.
Syllabus
IS331 Internship Course
Bard in Berlin Program Course
Instructor: Florian Duijsens, Agata Lisiak
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits (in combination with an internship)
Course Times: Thu 14:00-15:30
Students enrolled in the Bard College Berlin Internship Program are required to complete the Berlin Internship Seminar, an interdisciplinary course designed to accompany the internship experience. We will meet on a weekly basis and discuss contemporary ways of living and working in Berlin and beyond: What do we mean when we talk about work? Do we need to love what we do? What renders work in/visible? How is work gendered and classed? How is work organized temporally and spatially and how does it, in turn, affect the city and its residents? What distinguishes the spaces in which we live and work today? Which new forms of work have recently emerged in Berlin? Which of them seem to thrive? How do Berlin’s art institutions and citizen-activist organizations operate? Besides in-class discussions, invited lectures, and off-campus visits, the seminar offers a platform for the exchange of observations, reflections, and comments on individual internships.
Syllabus
EL202 ESL Writing Intensive Seminar
Instructor: Ariane Simard
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon 14:00-17:15
This course is designed to develop the writing skills of non-native English speakers to prepare for academic work in American Standard English (ASE). Over the semester, students will review grammar, learn how to cite academic sources, as well as develop an effective and original academic writing voice. We will put into practice essential writing techniques such as drafting, research, critical reading skills, rewriting and workshop. Students will be graded on three short essays (2-3 pp) and one in-class essay. Upon successful completion of the class, students should be able to think critically, as well as construct compelling narratives and effective written academic arguments. In addition to some poems, short stories, and non-fiction, we will explore Berlin to help us examine ideas about identity in a rapidly changing city.
Syllabus
Language Courses
GM101 German Beginner A1 (Group A)
Instructor: Narges Roshan
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 9:00-10:30
Syllabus
GM101 German Beginner A1 (Group B)
Instructor: Narges Roshan
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
Syllabus
GM101 German Beginner A1 (Group C)
Instructor: Christine M. Nilsson
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 14:00-15:30
Syllabus
GM101 German Beginner A1 (Group D)
Instructor: Mareike Stoll
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
Syllabus
GM101 German Beginner A1 (Group E)
Instructor: Christine M. Nilsson
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 15:45-17:15
Syllabus
GM151 German Beginner A2 (Group A)
Instructor: Ariane Faber
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 9:00-10:30
Syllabus
GM151 German Beginner A2 (Group B)
Instructor: Christiane Bethke
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 14:00-15:30
Syllabus
GM201 German Intermediate B1 (Group A)
Instructor: Christiane Bethke
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 15:45-17:15
Syllabus
GM201 German Intermediate B1 (Group B)
Instructor: Ulrike Harnisch
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 14:00-15:30
Syllabus
GM201 German Intermediate B1 (Group C)
Instructor: T. Weitz
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 9:00-10:30
GM251 German Intermediate B2
Instructor: T. Weitz
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
GM301 German Advanced C1
Instructor: Martin Widmann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon, Wed & Fri 15:45-17:15
Syllabus
GM150 German Conversation
Instructor: Narges Roshan
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed & Fri 14:00-15:30
The course is designed to help students boost their speaking skills and communicate in German with ease and confidence. Understanding and responding to what people speak on the street and in everyday situations poses challenges for many language learners; the course will tackle these challenges hands-on and from multiple angles, always with an eye toward what is most useful for students stepping beyond the “English language bubble” on campus. Classes will be structured around topics of student interest and combine vocabulary building and pronunciation exercises with the creation of various speaking scenarios where students practice expressing themselves spontaneously and explore dialects, accents and modes of intonation. The course is open to students who have completed A1 or have at least a basic understanding of the German language; the objective of the course is to create a comfortable speaking environment for beginners to advanced learners.
Syllabus
GM300 German for Reading Knowledge
Instructor: Ulrike Wagner
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Mon & Wed 14:00-15:30
This course is designed for students who wish to acquire German reading skills for research and study purposes. Focused on grammar topics and applied translation, texts read in class are chosen from a variety of genres and disciplines with special emphasis on philosophical writings. Students completing this course will have the necessary foundation for reading and translating written texts from German into English. The course is taught in English, focused on reading knowledge of the language only, and not on developing oral or written competencies. No previous knowledge of German is assumed.
Syllabus
LT322 Der deutsche Literaturbetrieb [Introduction to the German Literary World]
Module: Producing Literature / Writer and World
Instructor: Martin Widmann
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Wed & Fri 10:45-12:15
Syllabus
PT320 Discussing Deutschland: What Germans Are Talking About Today (in German)
Module: Literary Movements and Forms / Social Commitment and the Public Sphere
Instructor: Michael Thomas Taylor
Credits: 8 ECTS, 4 U.S. credits
Course Times: Tue & Thu 15:45-17:15
NB. Students taking the class should have B2 proficiency level in German.
Syllabus
All Bard College Berlin language courses address the development of skills in reading and listening comprehension, conversation and writing within the context of the European Framework of Languages from level A1 through C2.
Beginner German A1
Emphasis on familiar vocabulary building, listening comprehension and speaking with gradual introduction to grammar and writing skills.
Beginner German A2
Continued emphasis on listening comprehension and routine communication. Students read and write short, simple texts.
Intermediate German B1
Emphasis on communication skills including comprehension of standard speech and descriptive reading passages, topical conversation and simple, descriptive composition.
Intermediate German B2
Continued emphasis on communication skills including comprehension of extended speeches and lectures, reading of newspapers and general periodicals, spontaneous conversational interaction with native speakers and writing clear, detailed text on a wide range of subjects.
Advanced German Language C1
Development of listening and reading comprehension levels to include extended speech and some literary texts. Emphasis on conversational and writing skills to express ideas and opinions and present detailed descriptions expressing points of view.
Advanced German Language C2
Development of comprehension skills to allow for understanding of all forms of spoken language and written texts. Emphasis on communication skills for the fluent expression of ideas and argument both orally and in written form.
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