Faculty Profile
Antje Pfannkuchen
Associate Professor of German (2009)
Contact Information
Bosler Hall Room M11
717-254-8151
Bio
Antje Pfannkuchen is a researcher in German media studies, literature and cultural history. Her work is concerned with connections between (media)technology, science, literature and art, especially in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Most recently she co-edited "The Technological Introject," a volume engaging the ideas of Friedrich Kittler, mastermind of German media theory. She has also published on German Enlightenment poet and scientist Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, on Romantic physicist Johann Wilhelm Ritter and on Ezra Pound's interests in 19th century German science. Her current book project investigates the correlations of the history of electricity, German early Romanticism and the invention of photography. Courses she has taught include German Media Cultures, German Film, German Stories - classical and digital, Goethe Forever!, The Two Germanies, German Romanticism, German-Jewish Culture and all levels of German language.
Education
- M.A., FU Berlin, 2000
- M.P.S., New York University, 2002
- Ph.D., 2010
2023-2024 Academic Year
Fall 2023
GRMN 202 Int Grmn II: Mediated Grmn Clt
What was occupied Vienna like in post-WWII Central Europe? How does a film convey fear? Is German academic writing different from how I write papers at Dickinson? Posing these or similar questions, this course builds students’ basic intermediate level of cultural and linguistic skill and explores the challenges of understanding and communicating with various media in colloquial, academic, and professional contexts. As it does so, students will acquire a better understanding of contemporary and historical issues, anxieties, and desires in the German-speaking world. There will be a special focus on writing in different modes, as this is a writing in the discipline (WiD) course. Prerequisite: 201, or permission of the instructor.
GRMN 350 Dreams and Delusions
German Romantic writers in the early 1800s tried to counter the rationality of the Enlightenment with dreamlike stories and phantasmagoric tales. At the end of the same century Sigmund Freud took inspiration from these and other dreams when developing psychoanalysis as a new method to study the human mind and its delusions.
Spring 2024
GRMN 102 German in Everyday Life
This course is an introduction to the German language and culture of daily life. It focuses on the acquisition of language skills, such as speaking, reading, writing, and listening and does so while also learning about aspects of every-day cultures in German-speaking countries. Classes are small and emphasize communication. After successfully completing German 101 and 102, students are expected to have reached a basic level of intercultural and cross-cultural competence, that is, to be able to communicate with members of German-speaking cultures with an awareness of differences in language and culture. Classes meet five times a week. Prerequisite: 101 or the equivalent, or permission of the instructor.
FMST 210 Modern German Film
Cross-listed with GRMN 213-01.
This course includes weekly film screenings on Tuesdays at 7pm in Bosler 280.
This course will focus on German films in their cultural and historical context. Students will study selected films and develop a critical framework for viewing and analyzing them. When appropriate, Austraian and Swiss films will also be included. Topics may be early German Cinema, the New German Cinema, or post-unification films. Filmmakers may include Volker Schlondorff, Alexander Kluge, Werner Herzog, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, or F.W. Murnau, and may cover films such as Run Lola Run, Goodbye, Lenin, Head On, and The Lives of Others. Prerequisite: 202, if offered in German, or permission of the instructor.
GRMN 213 Modern German Film
Cross-listed with FMST 210-02.
This course includes weekly film screenings on Tuesdays at 7pm in Bosler 208.
GRMN 500 Independent Study