German

This course for foreign students is designed to improve students’ language skills and vocabulary. Areas of focus include grammar, conversation, writing exercises, and listening and reading exercises. In addition, excursions are planned to introduce students to German culture. Students work with cultural and historical topics in everyday situations and broaden their intercultural knowledge. They are introduced to independent learning methods and familiarize themselves with typical learning situations at German universities. In this class at the A2/B1 level according to CEFR, students review and learn basic grammar points and are systematically introduced to basic vocabulary, and they also consolidate and systematically build further basic grammar points and vocabulary. All four skills are developed and applied to everyday situations and some study-related situations.

This course provides an overview of the history of German literature from the 18th to the 21st century. Starting from the knowledge that the psychological sensitivities of an age are reflected in literature, and supported by reading and discussing representative texts, e.g. from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Heinrich Heine, Franz Kafka, Bertolt Brecht or Ferdinand von Schirach, the focus of the seminar is based on the following topics: the desires, demands, and utopias found in the literature; the influence of developments of the history of thought, social upheavals, and technological innovations on literary expression; the interplay between art, music, and literature; the ability of fiction to inspire social changes; and the ways in which respective authors incorporate literary legacies into their own works. A valid and living impression of literary development from the classical period to the present is provided through texts, and also through film clips and field trips. For instance, the course includes a visit to the Deutsches Historisches Museum and students obtain deeper insight into the art of the Romantic period with a tour through the Alte Nationalgalerie.

This in-depth seminar on the general methodology of psychotherapy focuses on child and adolescent psychotherapy with a focus on the consequences of trauma and child protection. The heart of the seminar is the dream-focused behavioral therapy, a modular and component-based therapy with about 16 sessions with the children and a caregiver. In addition, further methods of trauma therapy with children and adolescents and other trauma-related topics such as experiences of racism and discrimination and their consideration in psychotherapy are examined in more detail.

The seminar covers topics such as evaluation procedures, benefit assessments, adherence, and data protection and information security of digital health applications. As part of a project, students investigate selected digital health applications for different indication areas (such as alcohol consumption, insomnia, diabetes, fatigue, stress) and discuss the opportunities and risks of digital health applications for prevention and rehabilitation.

In this course, students are taught the foundational concepts of major stochastic fields and associated topics, including Statistics, probability, and combinatorics. The course is presented in “flipped-classroom” format, such that students are expected to learn concepts on their own, and then practice application in the classroom.

Berlin is called the most sexually open capital of Europe today. In clubs, bars, workshops and festivals, a broad range and mix of sexual orientations are created in different and also crossing scenes and sex-positive spaces. Homosexual, transgender, tantric, polyamory, sex-positive and BDSM-oriented persons meet and celebrate and create new sexual techniques and lifestyles in so-called sex-positive spaces. The government of Berlin has already recognized the economic dimension of the liberal sexual culture. What does liberal sexual culture exactly mean? What kind of historical roots are important to analyze, e.g. the anonymity of the big city, the homosexual movement and the golden twenties? What was and is avant-garde and when does it turn into commerce? Four sub-items will structure the seminar: Sex-positive spaces, LGBTQI+ and Gender-Fluidity, Kink and Tantra, alternative porn films and literature. Excursions and interviews with experts will be part of the seminar. We will work with texts and films, and students will develop their own research question and project.

This course examines the history of Berlin during the Cold War, with a specific emphasis on the Berlin Wall. Literary texts, historical documents, photographs, and films are used to analyze this period of time. The course explores perspectives from both sides of the wall on the two cultural, social, and political societies that existed in Berlin during the Cold War. The course discusses whether at this point in time the “wall in the head” (Peter Schneider) has degraded completely or persists in contemporary Berlin. Students actively participate in class and attend a number of excursions in the city.