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Taught in German. Today’s Berlin is a nerve center with strong impulses from Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, Vietnam, India, and other Eastern countries. Through contemporary literature and film, we will explore Berlin’s role in a globalized world: how Berliners resist, embrace, or simply describe the influx of people from Eastern countries; how West-Berliners have re-oriented themselves after the fall of the wall; how the majority adapts to the minorities; and how some migrant authors rework the German language by experimenting with translingual writing. By way of literary and filmic analysis, we will inquire if borders or limits can play a productive role; how the history of the divided city figures in the imaginary of immigrant authors; and how, for example, Turkish-German or Russian-German writers inscribe the tensions between East- and West-Berlin into a larger discourse on global East-West relations. Recommended Course Background: AS.210.362