Virtual Berlin: A Walk Through German History (part one)
9:00 a.m., Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2008
Webster Hall Auditorium
Admission: free

This presentation features a Web-aided “walk” through German history that focuses on the city of Berlin and its various changes over time. Using Web-based tools and PowerPoint presentations, the journey begins with the rise of Prussia in the 17th century and finishes with an in-depth look at present-day Berlin. The lecture is split into two parts, the first of which covers the time until 1989, while the second looks at the development of Berlin since German reunification. The overall goal is threefold: first, to provide a succinct overview of modern German history; second, to introduce the major cultural sights of Germany’s exciting capital; and finally, to add some reflections on the importance and use of digital media in contemporary culture and politics.

Carsten Strathausen is associate professor of German and English and chair of German and Russian Studies at the University of Missouri. He is the author of The Look of Things: Poetry and Vision around 1900, published in 2007 by the University of North Carolina Press, and the editor of a collection of essays on contemporary political philosophy forthcoming next spring from the University of Minnesota Press. He has also written numerous essays on European intellectual history, Marxist and psychoanalytic theory as well as German literature and film. Currently, he is completing a manuscript on The Aesthetics of New Media: Art and Politics in the Digital Age.