gb - Englisches Seminar - Ruhr-Universität Bochum

systems? What, apart from providing escapist entertainment or making profit, could
be the cultural functions served by the representations?
Assessment/requirements: Übung: short oral presentation and 4-page essay;
Seminar: participation in research project and 15-page term paper.
050 664 Budde
Images of Germany in Nineteenth-Century Ireland, 4 CP
2 st. mo 16-18 GABF 04/252 Nord
According to comparative image studies, a discipline dealing with the literary
representations of individual nations, the experience of a foreign nation is the most
important stimulus for reflections on one's own identity.
While the origins and functions of the image of Germany in English literature have
been extensively researched a detailed study of an Irish image of Germany in the
second half of the nineteenth century is entirely absent. It appears, however, that in a
number of works of Irish literature, within a certain strand of political commentary and
within an extensive debate on the pages of the most important religious magazines
an image of Germany is employed as a point of reference against which to measure
all aspects of Irish culture.
The objective of this seminar is, therefore, to fill the established gap in the existing
research by a detailed analysis of the image of Germany in Ireland. Its ultimate aim is
to establish a greater appreciation of the influence the critical engagement with
German culture exerted on the reconfiguration of an Irish identity. The scarcity of
secondary literature in this field of research means that participants will get the rare
chance of doing primary research and producing new insights into the mechanisms of
Irish identity constructions. Key texts will be provided via Blackboard.
Assessment/requirements: active participation, short presentation and term paper
(wissenschaftliche Hausarbeit).