Scholarly Summit to Mark German Department Centenary From: University Currents Date: April 19, 2000 By: Marianne Kunnen-Jones Phone: (513) 556-1826 Archive: Campus News, Research News While UC's Germanic languages and literatures department heads up a major initiative to look at Europe and its future in a new light, it's also preparing to celebrate the past. The past in question is its own. The department will be marking its centenary by hosting a celebration of UC scholarship April 27-29 at the Max Kade German Cultural Center. In 1875, an illustrated guide to Cincinnati wrote of "German and French" taught at the newly founded University of Cincinnati. However the department was not officially formed as an independent unit until 1900, when the first head, Max Poll, was hired away from his post at Harvard. From there, the department has grown to a faculty of 12 full- and part-timers, with about 22 graduate students and about 50 undergraduate majors and minors. Today it serves as the base for three major publications in the field: the Lessing Yearbook focusing on literary culture of the German Enlightenment; New German American Studies, an international monograph series, and Focus on Literatur, a graduate student journal founded at UC. It also offers language courses in Swedish, Japanese and Russian. The weekend conference, Jahrhundertwenden, meaning "turns of the century," will feature scholars from around the world - former department heads, former visiting professors and those who have earned advanced degrees from the department. Among the more than 20 presenters will be Guy Stern, who served as department head from 1964 to 1971 and is a current faculty member at Wayne State University, and UC alumnus George C. Schoolfield, an emeritus faculty member at Yale University. Schoolfield will discuss "Memories of an Innocent Undergraduate and Graduate in the Cincinnati Department (1944-47)." An exhibit of panels from a traveling display on Cincinnati's German American heritage and culture will also be featured at the conference. The anniversary events are open to the public and admission is free. All lectures are at the Max Kade Center, Room 736, Old Chemistry. The conference opens Thursday evening from 4 to 6 p.m.; continues on Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with a dinner at Mecklenburg Gardens at 7 p.m.; and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with dinner at the Kingsgate Conference Center at 7 p.m. Sponsors of the conference include The Max Kade Foundation, the Charles Phelps Taft Memorial Fund and the College of Arts and Sciences. For more information, call Richard Schade at 556-2756.