Recognizing cultural concepts: Joyce, Woolf, Mann and Musil

The purpose of this thesis is to establish a direct relationship between literature and fields of knowledge such as science and technology, by focusing on some concepts that were fundamental for both science and the humanities at the beginning of the 20th century. The concepts are those of simultaneity, multiple points of view, map, relativity and acausality. In the spirit of several recent ideas, for example Katherine Hayles’ isomorphism notion, the dissertation shows how writers such as James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Thomas Mann and Robert Musil developed the mentioned concepts within their narratives. The working hypothesis is that those concepts were at a crossroad of human activities, and that those authors used them extensively within their narratives. It is further argued that those same concepts – as developed by Joyce in Ulysses, Woolf’s shorts stories and novels from the end of the 1910’s until the end of the1920’s, Mann’s Der Zauberberg (The Magic Mountain), and Musil’s Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften (The Man Without Qualities) — are still fundamental for our conception of time and space today. The thesis is divided into two parts. The first two chapters will analyse the concepts of simultaneity and multiple points of view and their relationship to cartography as developed within English literature and culture. The next two chapters will address the concepts of relativity and acausality, as developed within German literature and culture.

"Fascinating Voids: Alexander von Humboldt and the Myth of Chimborazo"

When Alexander von Humboldt reached the village of Calpi in the Andes on 22 June 1802, he was greeted with reverence and enthusiasm. Triumphal arches adorned with cotton, cloth, and silver decorated his path. The natives performed a dance in festive dress. A singer praised the explorer's expedition, which had departed three years earlier from the Spanish port of La Coruña. Like Odysseus on the isle of the Phaeacians, the traveler listened to a local rhapsodist singing about his heroic deeds. Before his adventure ended, it had already spun a popular myth. This episode, which Humboldt recorded in his diary, occurred at a significant moment. One day later, the “Second Discoverer of America” rose to even greater fame on an excursion marking in more ways than one the climax of his enterprise. Humboldt set out to climb Chimborazo (6,310 m/20,702 ft.), the mountain then thought to be the highest in the world. He was accompanied by the French botanist Aimé Bonpland (1773–1858) and the Creole nobleman and future activist Carlos Montúfar (1780–1816), as well as native guides and assistants. They climbed to heights never reached before, setting a new record and catapulting Humboldt to fame on both continents.

Dynamik rationaler Bildungsentscheidungen im Familien- und Haushaltskontext. Eine empirische Untersuchung zum Bildungserfolg von ostdeutschen Jugendlichen in Armut

In der vorliegenden Studie wird der Frage nachgegangen, welche Auswirkungen Einkommensverluste und Armut auf den Bildungserfolg von ostdeutschen Jugendlichen haben. Aus einer lebensverlaufs- und handlungstheoretischen Perspektive wird ein dynamisches Mehrebenen-Modell entwickelt, um die Bedingungen und Kontexteffekte für rationale Bildungsentscheidungen aufzuzeigen. Demnach führt sozio-ökonomische Deprivation zu suboptimalen, risikoaversen Entscheidungen zugunsten kürzerer Schullaufbahnen und frühen Schulabschlüssen. Eltern mit einer ausreichenden Ausstattung mit ökonomischen und nicht-ökonomischen Ressourcen können jedoch ungünstige Auswirkungen von Arbeitslosigkeit und Armut verarbeiten und ihre Präferenzen für maximale Humankapitalinvestitionen aufrechterhalten. Für die empirischen Analysen werden Daten des Sozio-ökonomischen Panels (SOEP) herangezogen. Es bestätigte sich, daß ökonomisch benachteiligte, insbesondere arme Schüler auch beim Bildungserfolg benachteiligt sind. Familien können ökonomisch bedingte Nachteile in der Bildungskarriere ihrer Kinder teilweise durch die Mobilisierung ihres kulturellen und sozialen Kapitals ausgleichen. In Ostdeutschland bestehen Tendenzen für eine intergenerationale Transmission von Arbeitslosigkeits- und Armutsrisiken infolge mißlungener Schulausbildung von deprivierten Kindern und Jugendlichen.

Kafka en la obra de Antonio di Benedetto

La influencia de Kafka en los escritores argentinos del siglo XX es bien conocida y ha sido extenspmente estudiada especialmente en los autores centrales del canon literario, como son Borges y Sábato. Sin embargo. otros autores en los que se manifiesta dicha influencia son sistemáticamente excluidos de los estudios. Entre ellos se encuentra Antonio Di Benedetto. En el presente trabajo se analiza la presencia de una serie de motivos, caracterizados por la crítica como típicamente kajkianos en la novela más reconocida del mendocino: Zama. De esta manera se apunta a completar el panorama de la recepción de Kafka en la Argentina haciendo hincapié en la experiencia regional, que por su contexto especifico de producción es mucho más afin a la de Kafka que la de los escritores canónicos. Por otra parte, la detección y análisis de esos motivos constituyen una poderosa herramienta para el estudio de la obra dibenedettiana. pues no se trata meramente de la repetición de tópicos consagrados. sino de la manifestación de una experiencia muy personal del mundo.

Literatura en alemán escrita en la Argentina : problemática del estudio de una literatura de minorías

La literatura alemana escrita en el extranjero es todavía para la Germanística un problema no resuelto. La justificación de ello está, por un lado, en la complejidad que representa como objeto de estudio en sí mismo, y por otro, en la particular situación histórica de Alemania por su papel en la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Si bien a fines de los setenta se estudia este fenómeno dentro de los ámbitos académicos de Alemania, resulta difícil para la Germanística abarcar el objeto en su carácter específico y liberarse de juicios desvalorizantes, que juzgan a la literatura alemana del extranjero con los mismos patrones que a la producida en territorio de lengua alemana. Este artículo pretende indicar desde qué puntos de vista es posible investigar la literatura en alemán escrita en el extranjero, a partir del caso concreto de la literatura de los inmigrantes alemanes a la Argentina, considerando aportes epistemológicos que completan y enriquecen el de la Germanística.

One country, two societies? Germany twenty years after reunification. OSW Study 35/2011

3 October 2010 marked the twentieth anniversary of the reunification of the two German states. This is an occasion for summing up and evaluating the changes which have taken place in Germany since 1990. Germany became reunited through the incorporation of the East German federal states to the then Federal Republic of Germany. The West German point of view is predominant in public discourse regarding this issue, which is manifested through grading the new federal states for their progress in assimilation to the western part of Germany. However, this way the positive changes which have taken place in the social, political and economic areas in the eastern federal states over the past two decades are often disregarded. This paper is an attempt to show the changes which have taken place in Germany, involving areas in which new federal states have outperformed the western part of the country.

The Dilemmas of Diffusion: Institutional Transfer & the Remaking of Vocational Training Practices in Eastern Germany, CES Germany & Europe Working Papers, No. 05.10, 1996

Through a case study of the diffusion of the celebrated West Gennan "dual system" of vocational training to the territory of the fonner German Democratic Republic, we develop the argument that local sociopolitical relations matter crucially for the successful transfer and implementation of institutional arrangements. Notwithstanding massive levels of government funding, the presence of complementary supports, and the concerted efforts of Ger­many's social partners, the dual system is experiencing significant difficulties in the new federal states of the East. These difficulties are not due simply to the particular politics of unification (the wholesale transfer of West German institutions whether or not they were appropriate to Eastern Germany) nor even simply to the paucity of dynamic private firms capable of and willing to train new apprentices. The difficulties stem also from the under­ lying weaknesses of the East German sociopolitical infrastructure on which the entire dual system rests. This. hy­ pothesis is elaborated and substantiated through a range of data on training in the East and especially through the use of detailed case studies of Leipzig and Chemrutz.

Die spanischen Vorlagen der deutschen theologischen Literatur des 17. Jahrhunderts /

Abridged preprint of part of the author's thesis (doctoral)--Universität Freiburg i.B., originally presented under title: "Spaniens Antheil an der deutschen Literatur des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts." -- Strassburg : 1897.

Eins in's andere : Für die reifere jugend gesammelt.

Mode of access: Internet.

Der "Stobsiade."

Mode of access: Internet.

Unser Weg.

Mode of access: Internet.

Die Opale.

"Blätter für Kunst & Litteratur herausgegeben von Franz Blei. "

Grundriss zur Geschichte der deutschen Dichtung aus den Quellen /

Includes indexes.

Ansichten der Literatur und Kunst unsres Zeitalters.

The color plate is titled "Versuch auf den Parnass zu gelangen" and depicts German literary figures. The second plate is printed on transparent glassine paper and includes explanatory captions.