Humboldt University Berlin

This is a hands-on course that invites students to discover and engage with artists who have come to Berlin from abroad. Berlin’s thriving and dynamic arts scene has long drawn theater-makers, writers, actors, poets, musicians, and visual artists from all over the world. This course examines the experience of displacement and dislocation, the challenges of mobility and the demands of integration, but also the positive aspects of finding oneself in a new place and making it one‘s own, establishing a life and finding a community here. In addition to this theory-driven component, students also learn and apply basic journalistic skills as part of a hands-on exploration of the worlds created by these artists from abroad, in Berlin. Finally, students meet and speak with artist guest speakers from a range of fields, in addition to doing a deep dive on the life and work of one artist from abroad, who they profile for their final project.

The Brexit referendum of 2016 was a clash between two types of political representation in Britain: the "people’s will" versus the sovereignty of parliamentary sovereignty. Is this such a new phenomenon? This course explores this tension between the popular control of Parliament and the doctrine of indirect representation by Members of Parliament over the last 200 years British history.

In recent decades, a growing interest in material cultures and the sociology of space has elevated the status of architecture in sociological discussions. This seminar examines how different architectural forms take part in a range of different social practices. To what extent are they part of social practices, support or suppress them? The course adopts a simple scheme of spatial directions to discuss forms of enclosure (prisons), verticality (skyscrapers), liminality (borders), flows (logistics), etc.

This course focuses on writing simple texts. In addition to practical exercises, the students also reflect on their writing. The focus is on simple private and academic writing occasions: creative writing, notes, emails, handouts, CV. Students also prepare the writing of a short essay. The class content includes repeating and practicing linguistic resources of the elementary and intermediate levels. Joint discussion and the revision of students' own texts play a central role.