Department of Germanic Languages & Literatures University of Toronto

PhD candidate Office hours TBD Contact info sophie.jordan@mail.utoronto.ca Background My research focuses on late medieval understandings of cultural mixedness and alterity. For my thesis, I am exploring blackness and race in Middle High German and Middle Dutch Arthurian romance and trying to identify how the black characters featured in my texts fit into the cultural context they emerged from. I completed my B.A. and M.St. in German at the University of Oxford, with a year spent studying at the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität in Heidelberg. My M.St. dissertation engaged with the debate on pre-modern race by looking at blackness as a factor of integration at the court of King Arthur in the Middle Dutch Moriaen. I also hold an M.A. in Social Anthropology from the University of Manchester, which has allowed me to broaden my methodological horizons and to gain insight into the social mechanisms which are at the core of my research interests. I grew up near Strasbourg on the Franco-German border, but my first language was Frenglish. I love being outside, music from all periods, and food. Publications and Presentations: “Black Excellence at Arthur’s Court: Moriaen and Medieval Northern Germanic Concepts of Blackness.” German Studies Canada at the Congress of the ... Read More »

PhD candidate Contact info astrid.klee@mail.utoronto.ca Office Hours tba Classes 2024-25 tba Background My interests lie mainly in the sciences and mythologies, and how these impact on literary imagination. For my doctoral research, I am exploring how late 19th to early 20th-century psychiatric case studies and self-narratives transformed during this period and the ways in which this is reflected in Modernist literature in Germany. I translate early German psychiatric texts and I have co-authored several journal articles about pioneers in the field of psychiatric genetics. I completed my undergraduate in German Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, where I also received my master’s degree. Read More »

MA student Contact info rena.knox@mail.utoronto.ca Read More »

Ph.D. Candidate Contact elisabeth.lange@mail.utoronto.ca Office Hours By appointment (Zoom or Campus meeting possible) Courses 2022-2022 GER100 L5201 TR 6-8 (online synchronous), Fall Term GER300 L0101 MW 10-12, Full Year Background I received my Bachelor of Arts in German Literature and Language from the Leipzig University in summer of 2016. During my studies, I took a semester abroad at Carleton University in Ottawa and did an internship as a creative writer and editor at UFA in Berlin. I have an affinity for words, whales and the woods. Research My research focuses on the literary works of Marlen Haushofer and Sibylle Berg. In particular, I am investigating what it is precisely about the quality of their literature that inclines readers to frequently label it as “negative.” Thereby, I am offering new perspectives on the concept of pessimism and illustrate how we can think of the absence of salvation as something positive. Read More »

Ph.D. Candidate Contact rita.laszlo@mail.utoronto.ca Courses GER200Y1Y LEC5101 Office Hours Mon & Wed by appointment Background M.A. (2017) in Germanic Studies, University of British Columbia (Master’s thesis: “Understanding the Aesthetics and Materiality of Ver Sacrum, the Seminal Magazine of the Vienna Secession”) B.A. (2014) Hispanic Studies and Honours in Germanic Studies, University of British Columbia (Honours thesis: “Pseudoscience, Gullibility and Language”) OTHER: (2007–2010) Germanic and Hispanic Studies, International Relations, University of Manitoba (2009-2010) German Literature and Social Studies, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg, Germany Publications / Published Translations Laszlo, Rita K. “Introducing Ágnes Heller's “Reflections on Gullibility,”” Telos, Issue 179, 2017:33-35; doi:10.3817/0617179033 Heller, Ágnes. Trans. Laszlo, Rita K. “Reflections on Gullibility,” Telos, Issue 179 , 2017:36-47; doi:10.3817/0617179036 Research and Interests 19th and 20th century German Literature and Thought, Enlightenment, Critical Theory, The Frankfurt and The Budapest Schools gullibility and its relation to language, types of knowledge, reason, the will to believe and judgement PhD dissertation focus a genealogy of gullibility in German literature and thought Conferences / Presentations “Vortrag zum Thema Leichtgläubigkeit,” (guest lecture, GER 430: Stories of the Mind with Dr. Christine Lehleiter), University of Toronto, Toronto, Nov. 27, 2018. “Between Gullibility and Thoughtlessness: From Ágnes Heller to Hannah Arendt,” (guest lecture, PHIL ... Read More »

MA Student Contact info mark.morrisonreed@mail.utoronto.ca Read More »

M.A. Student Contact somaia.mostafa@mail.utoronto.ca Office Hours Tue & Thu 12:30-2, OH307 Read More »

PhD Candidate Contact florian.geddes@mail.utoronto.ca Courses GER 300: Intermediate German II, MW 10am-12pm Office Hours Tue 1-3pm Background My dissertation focuses on the corpus of late medieval and early modern books of heroes (working title: The Making of the ‘Book of Heroes’ (15th/16th c.): Textuality, Materiality, and the History of the Book), combining literary analysis with questions of materiality and book history. I am interested in the production and reception of epic poems between manuscript and print culture, the transformation processes throughout the textual history of these poems, and the ways in which manual labor, material, and text intersected in making books of heroes. Scholarships and Awards Connaught International Scholarship, University of Toronto, 2019–2024 Conference Papers “Closed Doors and Dwarven Secrets: Laurin’s Mountain Kingdom,” Medieval Undergrounds: The 16th Annual Toronto German Studies Symposium, May 2024. “Epic Poetry Between Manuscript and Print: The Making of the Heldenbuch,” International Graduate Colloquium for Medieval and Early Modern German Studies at Princeton University, Nov. 2-4, 2023. “Old Tales in a New Medium: On the Prefaces of Printed Books of Heroes (1479–1590 CE),” Cologne-Toronto Graduate Student Colloquium 2019.   Read More »

PhD candidate Contact info miriam.schwartz@mail.utoronto.ca Office Hours By appointment. Current Courses GER260 Elementary Yiddish Background Miriam Schwartz is a PhD candidate in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures and the collaborative program with the Anne Tanenbaum Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Toronto. Her research explores the representation of speech in Jewish literature written in Yiddish and Hebrew during the first half of the twentieth century, in Eastern Europe, Israel, and North and South America. She focuses on issues of translation, orality, and ideology. Prior to joining the University of Toronto, Miriam earned her BA in Literature and MA in Yiddish Literature at Tel Aviv University. Read More »

Ph.D Student Contact virginia.shewfelt@mail.utoronto.ca Office Hours Wed 10-12, Room 307 Courses 2018-2019 GER100Y L0301 FALL Introduction to German Monday - 11-1 Background I hold a Bachelor of Arts in German and Anthropology (2016) from Memorial University of Newfoundland as well as a Master of Arts in Germanic Languages and Literatures (2018) from University of Toronto. My research focuses on collective memory of the Holocaust in Germany. Read More »