CAUTG / APAUC

Conference “Cinema and Social Change in Germany and Austria”, University of Waterloo, May 1-3, 2008 

“Cinema and Social Change in Germany and Austria” is an interdisciplinary conference taking place at the University of Waterloo, Ontario May 1-3, 2008. Hosted by the Waterloo Centre for German Studies, it will examine contemporary cinema’s  responses to fundamental social changes. The conference includes keynote lectures by Paul Cooke (University of Leeds) and Barbara Pichler (Director Designate of the Diagonale film festival in Graz). Bringing together scholars from various disciplines, panels will explore the films of the “Berlin School”, questions of (trans)national and gender identities, collective memory, aspects of cinematic realism and authenticity, representations of (political) violence and other topics.

In conjunction with the conference, Kinofest, a film festival presenting new films from Germany and Austria, will take place at the Princess Cinema in Waterloo. On May 1st, film director Michael Schorr will be in attendance presenting his film “Schröders wunderbare Welt/Schroeder’s Wonderful World” (2006).

For further information about the conference, registration details and the conference schedule,  please visit the conference website http://www.wcgs.ca/filmconference/main.php.

For information about the film festival, please go to www.kinofest.ca

Gabriele Mueller, York University, Toronto gmueller@yorku.ca
James Skidmore, University of Waterloo skidmore@uwaterloo.ca

Gabriele Mueller
Dept. of Languages, Literatures and Linguistics
York University
Ross S414B
4700 Keele Street
Toronto, ON, Canada,  M3J 1P3
Phone: (416)736-2100, ext. 20078
Fax:   (416)736-5483

email: gmueller@yorku.ca

Seminar by Prof. John B. Lyon

Thursday, March 27 2:30pm-4:30pm

Seminar Room, Osler Library, McGill University

organized by Interacting With Print

15. März 2008

2. Undergraduate Colloquium on German Studies (UCGS)

Am 15. März 2008 hat das Goethe-Institut Toronto in Kooperation mit der McMaster University, University of Waterloo, University of Toronto und dem DAAD zum 2. Undergraduate Colloquium on German Studies (UCGS) eingeladen.

In diesem Jahr haben wir bereits mehr als doppelt so viele Vortragsvorschläge (20) von StudentInnen aus vielen verschiedenen Universitäten Kanadas erhalten. Wir mussten uns auf zwölf Vorträge einigen, da wir nur einen Tag für das Colloquium zur Verfügung hatten (siehe Liste der Vortragenden). Die höchst interessanten Themen, die die StudentInnen mit dem Publikum diskutierten beinhalteten Migrantenliteratur in Deutschland, Repräsentationen des Holocaust, der Wahnsinn in Büchners „Lenz“, religiöser Extremismus in Rilkes „Geschichten vom lieben Gott“, Rezeptions- und Vergleichsstudien zu diversen deutschen Filmen und Pennsylvanisch-deutsche Literatur in der Gegend in und um Waterloo, Ontario.

Der DAAD, vertreten durch Dr. Stefan Haas (Direktor des DAAD Informationszentrums Kanada) und Jessica Denenberg bereicherten das Colloquium durch eine Präsentation über den DAAD und einen Wein & Käse Empfang am Abend.

Es war ein erfolgreicher Tag, an dem alte Kontake auffgefrischt und neue geknüpft wurden.

Wir hoffen, dass wir 2009 wieder viele StudentInnen zum 3. Undergraduate Colloquium on German Studies begrüßen können. Das UCGS ist eine einzigartige Möglichkeit für junge StudentInnen ihre Arbeiten und Forschungen vorzustellen, Vortragserfahrung zu bekommen und in einer informellen Atmosphere ihre Ideen zu diskutieren.

Ganz persönlich möchte ich noch einmal Ruth Renters und dem Goethe-Institut für die großzügige finanzielle und organisatorische Unterstützung danken. Einen großen Dank auch an Barbara Schmenk von der University of Waterloo und Erol Boran von der University of Toronto für eine entspannte Zusammenarbeit (and many good laughs!). Danke!

Beste Grüße von der McMaster University Hamilton,

Steffi Retzlaff

Liste der Vortragenden beim 2. UCGS in Toronto:

Eva Ouyang, University of Toronto

Andreja Bozic, University of Toronto

Branka Marijan, McMaster University

Heather Dreger, University of Manitoba

Marketa R. Holtebrinck, University of Toronto

Iulia Miu, University of Toronto

Gregory French, Memorial University of Newfoundland

Max Cadmus, University of Toronto

Wonneken Wanske, University of Ottawa

Lora Murray, University of Toronto

Lisa Mohr, University of Western Ontario

Michael Turman, University of Waterloo

Title:
Everybody Talks about the Weather (We Don’t): The Writings of Ulrike Meinhof
Authors:
Ulrike Meinhof Ed. and introduction by Karin Bauer (McGill) Preface by Elfriede Jelinek Afterword by Bettina Röhl Translated by Luise von Flotow

Description:No other figure embodies revolutionary politics and radical chic quite like Ulrike Meinhof. In the 1960s, she was known in Europe as a public intellectual, leading a glamorous life in Hamburg with her publisher husband and twin daughters. Ten years later, Meinhof gave it all up to form, with Andreas Baader and Gudrun Ensslin, the Red Army Faction (RAF), also known as the Baader-Meinhof Gang, notorious for its bombings, bank robberies, and kidnappings of the wealthy. What impels someone to abandon middle-class privilege for the sake of revolution? Meinhof, who spent the 1960s writing a column for a popular leftist magazine, began to see the world in increasingly stark terms: the United States was emerging as an unstoppable superpower, massacring a tiny country overseas despite increasingly popular dissent at home, and Germany appeared to be run by former Nazis. Never before translated into English, Meinhof’s 1960s writings show a woman in transition, reflecting upon the major political events and social currents of her time. An essay by Karin Bauer contextualizes Meinhof’s writings and her mesmerizing life story. A relentless critic of her mother and of the Left, Bettina Röhl, one of Meinhof’s daughters, contributes a brief afterword that shows how Meinhof’s ghost still haunts us today.

April 10 – 11, 2008
Munk Center for International Studies
208 North Wing, 1 Devonshire Place
University of Toronto

For full program and updates: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/german

… with generous support from …
Germanic Languages & Literatures
The Joint Initiative in German & European Studies
The Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Cinema Studies Institute
Centre for Comparative Literature
Goethe-Institut Toronto
Stephen Berger Gallery

• Hito Steyerl Poster
• Stroke-Poster
• Program for Press

The European Studies Program at the University of Victoria is developing a new online information platform for German and European Studies in Canada. It aims at developing new information tools for the DAAD Canadian partner universities and a networking infrastructure for cooperation and outreach activities in German and European Studies in Canada. This project is funded by the German Academic Exchange Service DAAD and will be realized in collaboration with the Institute for European Studies (University of British Columbia), the Canadian Centre for German and European Studies (York University), the Joint Initiative in German and European Studies (University of Toronto) and Le Centre Canadien d’études allemandes et européennes (Université de Montréal).