Termine im WS 2012/13 - Englisches Seminar - Ruhr-Universität ...

Yet, the beginning of the 1930s is only one part of the history of a time that is often
labelled “the interwar period” – the time between the end of the First World War and
the beginning of the Second World War. Whereas the 1920s were a period of
considerable prosperity, often referred to as the “Roaring Twenties”, historians
usually paint a gloomy picture of the 1930s, with a society shaped by mass
unemployment and class divisions. The interwar period also saw the arrival of
consumer society, the breakthrough of the automobile and a massive restructuring of
public and private lives, setting the tone for what in 1920 H.G. Wells called a
“destruction of fixed ideas, prejudices, and mental limitations unparalleled in history”.
With the arrival of the Great Depression of the 1930s and the shaking of seemingly
‘fixed’ beliefs and values Britain was a damaged nation and on a new search of what
it meant to ‘belong’.
In the seminar we will look at a number of these ‘arenas of change’ of British cultural
life and try to challenge and critically engage with a number of common labels of the
interwar period. It will be our aim to understand how the impact of the Great War,
new forms of leisure and mobility began to have a major impact on society’s thinking
and behaviour. On a more global scale we will also analyse the radical changes in
the international order with special regard to Britain’s changing role in the world and
its relation to the newly-emerging superpower USA. Examples will include extracts
from contemporary literature ranging from novels, essays and new documentary
modes of realism such as George Orwell’s The Road to Wigan Pier (1937).
A reader with key texts will be provided at the beginning of the semester. Students
who already wish to engage in the topic can take a look at Martin Pugh’s study We
Danced All Night. A Social History of Britain Between the Wars (2008) and Robert
Grave’s and Alan Hodge’s The Long Weekend (1940).
Requirement for credit points: active participation, short presentation/participation in
an expert group and a final term paper.
To be able to attend, students need to have passed the “Introduction to Cultural
Studies”.
050 665 Werthschulte
Ethnicities in Post-War Britain, 4 CP
2 st. mi 12-14 GB 5/37 Nord
The arrival of the SS Windrush in Tilbury on 22 June 1948 is a watershed moment in
British history. Whereas the presence of people from Africa, the Caribbean and
South East Asia dates back long before the 20th century, the "Windrush Generation"
marks the beginning of the multicultural Britain that we take for granted today. This
course will look at the stories and narratives of those that have come to Great Britain
after World War II and those of their children and grandchildren. We will see how