German 850 Prof. John E. Davidson

Off the High Cultural Horse: From Trivial to Mass to Pop

This course examines several key texts and debates in the development of culture outside and away from the high literary tradition. This examination will take place in three different units. The first will engage with primary literature and secondary discussions from the early and mid nineteenth century. In connection with these historical works we will consider preliminary attempts in the world of contemporary Germanistik to expand its object of study to include "Trivialliteratur." In the second unit we will examine the impact of new technologies and other media (serialized novels, photography, film, and radio) on conceptions of culture in Germany, paying particular attention to the so-called "Kinodebatte" and ideas about the "Americanization" of German culture in the first half of this century. While some of the responses to these historical developments will be thoroughly negative, this will not always be the case. We will also consider thinkers who saw positive and even utopian potential in the products of mass culture, The third unit will consider different attempts to conceive of culture in the post-WWII, post-Holocaust, late-capitalist Western world. These attempts will range from a disdainful rejection of mass culture in favor of an autonomous art refusing any link to the market on the one side, to a playful celebration of the possibilities of pop, trash, and black comedy. We will consider them in the context of recent bestsellers and cinema hits as we ourselves try to sort out the best means of approaching contemporary popular culture critically: that is, with an understanding of its pleasures and possibilities as well as its regressive moments.

Students will be asked to:

- demonstrate the completion of all reading assignments through timely submission reading responses and active participation in class discussion [25%];

- take responsibility for leading one discussion on a work or topic to be arranged in advance with the instructor [15%]; and

EITHER

- write a paper of 10-15pp examining and/or comparing one or more of the works read in the course [50%], then prepare and present to the class a 1-2 pp abstract of the paper [10%]

OR

Reserve Reading including works from Adelson, Adorno, Benjamin, Bloch, Brecht, Doty, Engelsing, Fisk, Hansen, Jameson, Kinodebatte, Kreuzer, Prutz, Schlegel, Sedgwick, Solger, among others.