Welcome to the Department of Germanic Languages & Literatures at the University of Virginia
In
1966, the Department of Modern Foreign
Languages at
Virginia
was broken up and the Department of Germanic and
Slavic Languages and Literatures was formed under the chairmanship of
William
A. Little, who had just been hired away from
Tufts
University. Mr. Little was still chair
in 1971 when
Slavic Languages was separated and for the first time
Virginia
had a department devoted
exclusively to Germanic Languages and Literatures.
Although this original name remains, and
although both Dutch and Swedish have been taught in the past, it is now
really
a department of German literature and culture with a developing focus
on German
Studies. Its most
illustrious former
members include the late Frank G. Ryder, Walter H. Sokel, and Ruth
Klüger, who
was the first woman to chair an Arts & Sciences department at
Virginia.
The Department has always been distinguished by its innovativeness. It was, in the early 1970s, one of the very first German departments in the country to streamline its doctoral qualifying examinations and requirements into the form that is by now more or less universally accepted. It established the first national graduate-student conference devoted exclusively to German literature and history. It organized the first undergraduate language house at the University of Virginia. And it was both first in Virginia, and very early nationally, in having its undergraduate students produce and perform in public, every year, a play in German.
The Department has always been distinguished by its innovativeness. It was, in the early 1970s, one of the very first German departments in the country to streamline its doctoral qualifying examinations and requirements into the form that is by now more or less universally accepted. It established the first national graduate-student conference devoted exclusively to German literature and history. It organized the first undergraduate language house at the University of Virginia. And it was both first in Virginia, and very early nationally, in having its undergraduate students produce and perform in public, every year, a play in German.