Lydia Tang, Patrizia McBride, Vance Byrd, Didem Uca, Regine Criser, Friederike Eigler, and Johannes von Moltke in conversation about the future of German studies.

The DDGC Blog editors welcome submissions to the DDGC Blog throughout the year. If you have a project, reach out!

Contribute to the multicultural Germany project with blog pieces reflecting the relevance of German studies today.

Report on the first DDGC Town Hall on the job market crisis. Featuring key information that guides the development of initiatives in the DDGC.

Oliver Niels Völkel reflects on queer history in the German language classroom and provides examples as well as a theoretical justification for the work.

Nicole Coleman reflects on the 2020 DigPedLab and activates insights from their workshops for German studies classroom practice.

Sarah Vandegrift Eldridge reflects on the relevance of 18th-century German studies and provides a critical annotated bibliography for a reading list for those interested.

A promise of solidarity from DDGC, WiG, the GSA, BGHRA, and the CAUTG Social Justice Committee addressed to international students in German studies.

Domenic DeSocio offers an overview of how to integrate queer German studies into German language and culture studies programs.

DDGC Steering Committee solidarity statement with #BLM.

Todd Heidt reflects on the necessity for inclusive approaches to German studies.

David Gramling reflects on the lessons learned from the open letter to the AATG.

Regine Criser and Ervin Malakaj call for care and support in German studies during the time of a global pandemic.

Julia Ruck reflects on classroom work on discrimination and students’ roles and attitudes during this work.

By choosing Peter Handke, the members of the academy have indulged in an unflinching endorsement of a genocide denier. If they were trying to insult the literary readership, they have insulted themselves. Anyone who is celebrating this award is insulting the very dignity of human beings.

I would like to argue that German Studies scholars are not only particularly well positioned to engage with migration and its discontents; given the history of German-speaking cultures and the dire situation for migrants and asylum-seekers in the U.S. and worldwide, condemning xenophobic, anti-minority, and racist discourses is also our most solemn duty.

With young adults as my students, one of my responsibilities is to guide them toward deeper self-reflection. For that reason, I often include assignments in my courses that ask students to reflect on their own learning experiences and their own development as people who are able to find answers and teach themselves new skills. Such a practice also aligns with the overall educational goals of my institution, Northeastern University, and with the World Readiness Standards put forward by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL).

Today, with 40 million internally displaced peoples, 25.4 million refugees, and 3.1 million asylum seekers globally, the discipline has much to accomplish by addressing stories of escape, trauma, resettlement and expulsion, and the terms “precarity,” “fear,” “empathy,” and “intimacy,” as it has already begun to do.

It matters because it gives us the language to process these emotions and better understand how their expression shapes our world.