What is the degree program about?

In the field of Modern German Literature you will deal with German-language works from the Luther era to the immediate present, whereby non-fictional texts such as travel reports, reportages, or diaries are considered in addition to poetry in verse and prose. The indexing is carried out under historical and systematic perspectives, and the cultural contexts play just as important a role as questions of classification, aspects of media dissemination, or references between German literature and other national literatures.

In the history of older German literature (medieval studies), one learns to deal with texts from the period of the Middle Ages (ca. 800 to 1500). In contrast to popular contexts, such as fantasy literature or medieval festivals, the focus is on a reflected scientific and historical examination of the literature of this epoch, which is (only) quite foreign to us at first glance. Heroic epics such as the Nibelungenlied are used, for example, to discuss the historical development of gender roles, to examine the form of presentation of the narrative text, or to pose questions about the practice of transmission. Knowledge of Middle High German is acquired during the course of study.

Linguistics deals with the structure and use of language. Language is the object of study as something material, audible or written, which can be analyzed in terms of its components, units and functions. Language is also the means of communication used by human beings. From this point of view, the specifics of oral versus written communication, linguistic varieties such as dialects and colloquialisms, as well as the historical variability of language become topics of study.

German didactics is the science of subject-specific teaching and learning in connection with the German language, literature and their media bases. In this sense, German didactics comprises three core areas: language, literature and media didactics. All three areas are located in the subject and educational sciences. The Chair for Didactics of German Language and Literature at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg is committed to this basic understanding of German didactics in teaching and research and has its own profile.
In all courses of study supervised by the Chair of Didactics of German Language and Literature, the relation of subject-specific and subject-specific didactic theory to pedagogical practice fields plays a central role in the courses offered. Students can acquire sound knowledge both in the form of a broadly based fundamental knowledge and in the context of special areas of interest.