Welcome to
Qinna Shen's Homepage
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Salzburg 2004
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Contact me at: qinna.shen@yale.edu
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The Berlin Wall, 2004
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Education
Yale University (09/2002-present)
Ph.D.
program,
Germanic Languages and Literatures, Ph.D. expected 12/2008
Dissertation:
“From
Jacob Grimm to GDR Witches: Feminist Witchcraft and Magical Realism in
East
German Women’s Writing” (abstract)
Advisor:
Prof.
Katie Trumpener, Department of Comparative Literature, Yale University
M.Phil.
and M.A., Germanic
Languages and Literatures, received in December 2005
University of Chicago (09/2006 - 08/2007)
Exchange
Scholar
and Lecturer in College
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (8/2000-8/2002)
Ph.D. program,
Germanic Languages and Literatures, M.A received in August 2002
Heidelberg
University
(10/1997-07/1999)
Zwischenprüfung+2 Hauptseminare in Germanic Languages and
Literatures
Beijing Foreign Studies University (1994-1997)
B.A. program, Germanic
Languages and Literatures
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Teaching
Experience
Visiting Assistant
Professor/Instructor, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio
"The German-American
Experience," Fall 2008
"Folk & Literary Fairy
Tales," Fall 2008
Second-year German, Fall
2008
Lecturer
in
College, University
of
Chicago
“Deutsche Märchen,” Summer
2007
Lecturer
in
College, University
of
Chicago
“Elementary German for
Beginners,” (Textbook: Kontakte),
Fall and
Winter Quarter 2006-7
Instructor,
Hyde Park
Language Program, Chicago, IL [more information about Hyde
Park Language Program]
“Reading German
for Graduate Students,”
(Textbook: German for Reading Knowledge, 5th
edition), Summer 2007
Teaching
Assistant, Yale
University
“Elementary German for
Beginners,” (Textbook: Neue Horizonte),
Fall
and Spring Semester 2004-5
Teaching
Assistant, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
“Elementary
German for Beginners,”
(Textbook: Deutsch, Na Klar!) Fall and Spring
Semester 2001-2
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Classes of my Design
1. The GDR
in Literature and Film (Hypothetical
Syllabus)
This
course is an introduction
into the literature and film from and about the former German
Democratic
Republic, produced before, during and after the Wende. Readings include
the most important
and representative works, which will familiarize students with various
authors,
films, relevant periods, themes and debates. The works are organized
mostly in
a chronological order with important thematic focuses attached to each,
such as
the anti-fascist literature in the immediate post-war years, the
production
novels of the fifties, the “arrival novels” of the sixties, the
feminist
literature of the seventies and the underground cultural scene of the
eighties.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall, the GDR literature and film
underwent an
extended process of reevaluation, spurred
partly by political revelations, the opening of previously sealed film
archives, and the belated release or publication of banned works. The
GDR
literature and culture faced the danger of total negation by West
German
critics, as the literary debate triggered by Christa Wolf’s What
Remains
signaled. But this
corpus of works, fascinating both
aesthetically and historically, has interested many scholars in Germany and
abroad. From 1989 onwards, the
GDR continues to engage, haunt, and inspire writers and film-makers.
The film The
Lives of Others (2006), which won the Oscar for the best foreign
film of
the year, shows the continuing interest in the GDR era.
2. East German Adaptations of Grimms'
Fairy Tales (Hypothetical
Syllabus)
You have read
the Grimms’ fairy tales when you were a child. I would like to assume
that you
read them in English, and it was more about the stories back then. This
course,
however, concerns comparison of the Grimms’ tales with their modern
adaptations
in literature and film. In particular, we will focus on those
adaptations by
East German writers and filmmakers. Considering itself the true heir of
the
German humanist tradition, the German Democratic Republic, or in short,
the GDR
enshrined the Grimms’ folktales as a sacred cultural heritage, and
prohibited
critical tampering with them. Nonetheless, authors like Franz
Fühmann wrote
many modern fairy tales, many of which resort to the Grimms’ tales in a
critical manner. DEFA, the State Studio of the former East Germany, made 23 Grimm adaptation
films, not
including the animation films, silhouettes films, and those only shown
in
television. Thus out of the 200 children’s films made by DEFA between
1946 and
1990, over 10% of them are adaptations from the Grimms. We will discuss
the
cultural politics for children’s films, the relationship between
aesthetics and
politics, and changes occurred during the four decades.
This course
offers you an opportunity to critically analyze the Grimms’ tales and
their
adaptations. You will not only read more Grimms’ tales, but also learn
more
about the GDR history and culture. When we read or watch the modern
adaptations, we should keep these questions in mind: what is changed?
What
could have motivated the change? Does the adaptation align itself with
the
state ideology? Or does it contain a critique of the GDR? Does the
adaptation
engage critically with the Grimms’ original, and how? What can you say
about
the form and structure of the individual tale?
Teaching interests: 1)
Language courses at all levels; 2) Survey courses in German literature;
3)
German Fairy Tales; 4) Franz Kafka; 5) Plays by Bertolt
Brecht; 6) Christa Wolf; 7)
East
German literature and film; 8)
Holocaust
literature and film; 9) New German Cinema.
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Fellowships,
Awards and Honors
University
Dissertation Writing Fellowship, Yale University, 2007-8
Stipendium des Ministeriums
für Wissenschaft, Forschung und Kunst
Baden-Württemberg,
Summer 2004
Max-Kade Travel
Grant, Department of German, Yale University, Summer 2004
Hermann J. Weigand
Fellowship, Department of German, Yale University, 2002-4
University Henry
H. L. Fan Fellowship, Yale University, 2002-4
Invitation to join
the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2002
University
Fellowship, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2000-1
First
Place Scholarship, awarded to the top student in the
Department of German, Beijing
Foreign Studies University, 1995
Distinguished New Student
Scholarship, Beijing Foreign Studies University, 1994
Third Position in Humanities among over 30,000 candidates in Zhejiang Province in the National
College Entrance Exams of China,
July 1994. Eligible for any Chinese
University.
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Publication
Shen, Qinna. “Shedding,
Witchcraft, and the Romantic Subject: Feminist Appropriation of the
Witch in
Sarah Kirsch’s Zaubersprüche.”
Neophilologus. 2008.
Shen, Qinna. “Feminist
Redemption of the Witch: Grimm and
Michelet as Nineteenth-Century Models.” Focus on
German Studies.
Volume 15. 2008.
Trumpener, Katie. “Restructuring Identification: DEFA as Counter-Cinema
1946-1961.” Trans.
Qinna
Shen. “Chong Zu Ren Tong Jie Gou, Dong De De Fa
Zhi Pian Chang 1946-1961 de
Dian Ying.” Dang
Dai Dian Ying (Contemporary
Cinema). Issue 5. Beijing: China Film Art Research Center, 2007. 136-142.
Shen, Qinna, trans. “You
Are Still Your Parents’ Children: The New
German Left and Everyday
Anti-Semitism” and “Why I am leaving.” A Jew in the New Germany:
Henryk Broder.
Ed. Sander
Gilman and Lilian Friedberg. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2004. 21-36.
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Professional
Presentations in 2008
“Becoming
a Man: Witches’ Transsexual Performance in East German Sex
Change Stories,” to be presented at the Modern Language Association
convention
(MLA), Panel: “Middlesex in World Literatures,” chaired by Prof. Chantal Zabus. San Francisco, CA, December 2008. (withdrawn due to personal reasons)
“Problematizing the Witch Image in Grimm: A
Paradox between Deutsche Mythologie and Kinder- und
Hausmärchen,”
to be presented at the American Association of Teachers of German
(AATG) 2008
meeting, Panel: “The Brothers Grimm,” chaired by Prof. Bruce Spencer.
Orlando,
Florida, November 2008.
“Problematizing Wu-wei
in Alfred
Döblin’s Die Drei Sprünge des Wang-lun. Chinesischer Roman,” to be presented at
the German Studies Association (GSA) conference, Panel: “Reconsidering
Alfred
Döblin,” chaired by Prof. Tobias Boes. St.
Paul, Minnesota, October
2008.
“Continuity
and
Change: Contextualizing DEFA’s Grimm Series” to be
presented at the American
Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) 2008 Annual Meeting,
Panel: “Departing from the Grimms” co-chaired by Prof. Nicole Thesz and
Qinna
Shen. Long Beach, California, April
2008.
“ ‘Der
weibliche
Ketzer heißt Hexe’: Feminist
Appropriation of the
Witch in Women’s Writing before and after the Wende” to be presented at
the
Northeast Modern Language Association Conference, Panel “German-German Problems:
Continuities and
Discontinuities in Post-unification Germany” chaired by Prof. Barbara
Mabee.
Buffalo, New York, April 2008.
Previous Presentations
from 2003-2007
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Non-Curriculum
Activities
Directing the
student play “Pyramus und Thisbe,” German department cabaret, Yale, 2005.
Singing performance
of “Der Lindenbaum,” German department event, Yale, 2005.
Singing
performance of “Lustig ist das Zigeunerleben,” German department
cabaret, Yale,
2004.
Recitation of
“Römische Elegie” by Goethe, German department annual poetry
recitation, Yale,
2003; Recitation of “Die
Nähe” by Christian Morgenstern, 2002.
Student member on
the courses and curricular committee, German department, University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2001-2.
Leading actress in
the play “Die Physiker” by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, in the German
Plays
Competition organized by
DAAD in Beijing, 1997. [See
Picture]
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