German in the world - historical and contemporary perspectives
About
The course is sociolinguistically oriented and treats the present-day and historical position of the German language in different parts of the world. You study and apply linguistic theories of multilingualism, minority languages, language contact and language policy both from a historical and a contemporary perspective.
The course starts with an overview of the geographic dispersion of the German language in different periods and a discussion of theoretical and methodological issues.
The course then has two thematic centres of gravity: First, the emphasis is on the geographic area where German is a majority language (i.e. present-day Germany, Austria and Switzerland). In case studies, we study the relation between different German varieties in society and the influence of other languages both in earlier language periods and today.
The other theme is German as a minority language in different parts of the world both in the past and today. We discuss language-political questions in relation to different situations with language contact.
Prerequisites and selection
Selection
Selection is based upon the number of credits from previous university studies, maximum 165 credits.
After graduation
What happens next? Further studies? Apply for a degree? Search for a job? How can you plan forwards to get your dream job?
There are many questions, and some answers can be found here:
https://www.gu.se/en/study-in-gothenburg/after-your-studies
Facilities
Our campus - Humanisten
Address: Renströmsgatan 6
