About Southeast German Studies Workshop
Welcome to the Fourteenth Southeast German Studies Workshop (SEGSW), which will be held on March 24-25, 2022 on the campus of Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. In light of the ongoing pandemic past the recent omicron wave, we will also include hybrid components and offer access to all programs via ZOOM (to participants and the general audience). Members of the general public can contact the Center for Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies for access and further information.
The southeastern region of the United States is home to a large number of accomplished scholars, rising junior faculty, and talented graduate students with interests in German history, literature, and culture. Seeing the need for a forum for scholarly exchange and conversation among German Studies professors and students in the region, the Southeast German Studies Consortium, with funding from a variety of sources, has thus far convened thirteen workshops: at the University of South Carolina (2008 & 2009); Georgia State University (2010 & 2011); the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (2012 & 2013); Davidson College and the University of North Carolina-Charlotte (2014 & 2015); the College of Charleston (2016 & 2017); Emory University (2018 & 2019); and -- as a virtual program -- Appalachian State University (2021).
At the workshops, scholars from more than twenty different public and private institutions of higher education from Alabama to Washington, D.C. will convene for two days of invigorating, informative, and collegial discussions about key issues in German and -- in 2021 & 2022 -- German-Jewish Studies. The format of the meetings allows for formal and informal networking among the scholars who participate. The workshops also include public keynote lectures by renowned scholars. In 2022, Prof. Shmuel Feiner (Bar-Ilan University, Israel) will deliver the keynote.
Much of the Southeast German Studies Workshop’s success to date lies in its distinctive format. Except for the keynote lecture, the meeting eschews formal panel presentations in favor of more democratic group discussions of pre-circulated, three-page “position papers” that participants have written on one of the workshop’s three central themes. These themes, in turn, reflect subjects that have animated recent scholarship in German (and German-Jewish) Studies. All participants – regardless of rank, experience, and discipline – are encouraged to share their insights during the group discussions. To maximize the potential for personal engagement, the workshop caps at no more than 40-50 participants.
It is a particular strength of this workshop that it has always included graduate students and, if possible, advanced undergraduates. For these students, the Southeast German Studies Workshop has often been the first academic engagement outside of their home institution and has provided a significant professionalization and networking opportunity that has regularly resulted in further conference or panel presentations elsewhere.
The workshop also benefits teaching. Participants have regularly discussed and shared teaching materials, syllabi, and pedagogical techniques; some have subsequently even visited one another’s institutions for guest presentations in colleagues’ classes.