Dear colleague,

I would like to remind you that the deadline for submitting an abstract for the German Film Learning Initiative is 20th March 2013. The GFLI is led by postgraduate students in collaboration with the Departments of German and World Cinemas at the University of Leeds and the School of European Languages, Translation and Politics at Cardiff University. This project is designed to develop key skills among postgraduate students, demonstrate the vibrancy and range of research in German film and promote German studies in secondary schools. Please see details below and feel free to forward this message to postgraduate students that you think may be interested but are perhaps not on the German Studies list.

Best wishes,

Hannah O’Connor

Postgraduate Researcher

Cardiff University

***

Call for Participants: German Film Learning Initiative (GFLI)

We would like to invite postgraduate students to take part in the AHRC-funded project, the German Film Learning Initiative. A joint initiative between the University of Leeds and Cardiff University, the GFLI seeks to provide postgraduate research students with valuable teaching skills and experience of widening participation initiatives by engaging with A-Level pupils through German film.

The GFLI will develop and use the skills of postgraduate students to inspire the language learners of the future. By creating a teaching resource which will support the delivery of A-Level German in the classroom, the GFLI will demonstrate the range of possibilities available to future students of undergraduate German. The close engagement of postgraduates with secondary schools and colleges will, in return, allow postgraduates to develop their own teaching practices and engage in widening participation and IMPACT initiatives.

The project comprises two training days. The first training event will take place in Cardiff on 24 April 2013 and will explore issues of content delivery, presentation skills and engaging with audiences beyond academia. Using these skills, postgraduates will then be asked to develop a 20-minute presentation for teachers to use in classrooms that will be filmed for the GFLI website. Filming will take place during a one-day symposium at the University of Leeds in June 2013. Bursaries of up to £100 per training day are available to assist with travel costs.

Postgraduates will be allocated a Partner School and will liaise with a designated teacher to develop a presentation which will address directly the pupils’ needs in that school. The uploaded content will then be made available to all schools. A limited number of places also are available for postgraduates wishing to present a free choice of film. With this in mind, papers might address, but are not limited to titles including Der Rote Kakadu (Dominik Graf), Die weiβe Rose (Michael Verhoeven), Des Teufels General (Helmut Käutner) or Alles auf Zucker (Dani Levi). Presentations will be in English and applications are welcomed from postgraduates from all fields.

Abstracts for proposed film presentations (200-250 words) and an academic biography of no more than 100 words should be submitted to Hannah O’Connor ([log in to unmask]) no later than 20 March 2013.