German Studies (BA) (Full-Time, 2021 Entry)
This course is closed
for Clearing 2023
This course is closed for Clearing 2022
If you would like to study at Warwick, there are other courses available for 2024 entry.
UCAS Code
R220
Qualification
Bachelor of Arts (BA)
Duration
4 years full-time, normally including a year abroad
Start Date
27 September 2021
Department of Study
School of Modern Languages
Location of Study
University of Warwick
German Studies at Warwick provides the opportunity to explore the extraordinary breadth and depth of German language and culture in collaboration with recognised experts in the field.
Course overview
Germany has always been at the heart of the European intellectual tradition and is now the driving force of its economy and the EU. Our modules reflect the range and diversity of Germany’s culture, history and society. Intensive language work opens up the richness of German language and cultural life. This means you’ll graduate as a highly qualified linguist with advanced intercultural skills, and a deep understanding of key issues and developments in Germany’s past and present.
Your second or third year is normally spent abroad, either as a language assistant, or working or studying at one of our partner universities (at present including Berlin, Munich, Cologne and Dresden). We also currently hold a residential course in Germany open to all of our students on their year abroad. When you return to Warwick, you can choose research-led modules taught by leading thinkers in their field. You will have access to outstanding facilities and resources, including flexible, collaborative and individual learning spaces, as well as a vast selection of print, digital and multimedia learning materials.
Course structure
In your first year, you will take language classes designed to develop your knowledge and understanding of written and spoken German. To complement your language skills, you will follow two cultural modules that focus on the history and culture of German society since 1945 and German culture in the late eighteenth century. These modules provide an excellent and comprehensive foundation for studying further aspects of German literary, visual and political culture in the later stages of your degree. Every year, throughout your degree, you will be able to choose one further module; this may be one of the interdisciplinary cross-School modules, a new language (from one of the four major language departments or the Language Centre), or a new module from another academic department.
In your intermediate and final years, you will go on to further develop your German language skills. In addition to cultural modules on nineteenth, twentieth and twenty-first century German culture, you will have an opportunity to develop your own particular interests by choosing from a wide selection of modules offered by German specialists that cover a broad range of subjects in German culture, society, literature, politics, philosophy, film, history and business, as well as translation and transnationalism. You can also opt to study some of our interdisciplinary cross-School modules.
You can normally choose to spend your year abroad studying at a university in a German speaking country or on a British Council Assistantship or a work placement. Currently, during the year abroad, students usually attend a residential orientation course in Germany at Easter time. Led by departmental staff, who travel out to lead the event, the course offers skills development, pastoral care, careers advice and guidance on final year study.
How will I learn?
We employ a variety of teaching styles, including: lectures; seminars of about 15 students, in which the emphasis is on student participation; and written and spoken language classes in small groups. You will spend the rest of your time studying independently, preparing for classes, reading and analysing materials set for study, writing essays and working on your language skills.
Contact hours
There will be around 12 contact hours per week.
Class size
Seminars generally involve around 15 students.
How will I be assessed?
We will track your progress through language assignments, essays, presentations, portfolio submissions and examinations (written and oral). Throughout your course you will receive detailed, personalised feedback to help you to improve your skills. The final degree classification is determined by your intermediate- and final-year marks; each of these years contributes 50%.
Your year abroad
We strongly recommend that students take a year abroad, if they are able to. Students may move to a three-year degree if circumstances do not permit them to complete a year abroad. In such cases, there will be further language reinforcement work and students will be encouraged to spend time abroad in other ways, during vacation times.
You will usually spend your year abroad doing one of three things:
- Working as a language assistant teaching English in a primary or secondary school
- Studying full-time at a partner university in your chosen country
- On a work placement
The year abroad options are flexible so we recommend you check the department's subject pages for more details.
General entry requirements
A level:
- ABB to include German
IB:
- 34 to include 5 in Higher Level German
BTEC:
- We welcome applications from students taking BTECs alongside A level German
Additional requirements:
You will also need to meet our English Language requirements.
International Students
We welcome applications from students with other internationally recognised qualifications.
Find out more about international entry requirements.
Contextual data and differential offers
Warwick may make differential offers to students in a number of circumstances. These include students participating in the Realising Opportunities programme, or who meet two of the contextual data criteria. Differential offers will be one or two grades below Warwick’s standard offer (to a minimum of BBB).
Warwick International Foundation Programme (IFP)
All students who successfully complete the Warwick IFP and apply to Warwick through UCAS will receive a guaranteed conditional offer for a related undergraduate programme (selected courses only).
Find out more about standard offers and conditions for the IFP.
Taking a gap year
Applications for deferred entry welcomed.
Interviews
We do not typically interview applicants. Offers are made based on your UCAS form which includes predicted and actual grades, your personal statement and school reference.
Year One
Modern German Language 1
You will develop your translation, grammatical and speaking skills in German, and in doing so broaden your vocabulary and range of idiom, expression and awareness of various stylistic registers. You will work in a pair or group on a media project under the supervision of a tutor, which will contribute to your end-of-year mark in spoken German.
The Changing Face of Germany in Film and Text
In your study of the intellectual history of post-war Germany, you will consider the rise of the mass media and the role played by writers and intellectuals. Through your analysis of diverse literary and filmic texts, you will build your understanding of major landmarks in German history, including post-WWII political reconstruction, the development of the press in the Federal Republic, unification and military reintegration, the opposition to rearmament and student movements, and migration and settlement. The work of intellectuals such as Heinrich Böll, Peter Weiss, Bernhard Schlink, Rainer Werner Fassbinder and Paul Verhoeven will inform your studies.
Power and Passion: The Making of Modern German Culture
Starting with the study of the social milieu of late 18th century Germany, you will consider the cultural and intellectual changes of this period, and in particular the rise of the middle classes in the Age of Enlightenment. You will engage with the work of the globally significant writers of this period, including Goethe and Schiller, and study the light they cast on the emerging middle-class consciousness just prior to the cataclysmic changes of the French Revolution of 1789.
Intermediate Year^
Modern German Language 2
In this second-year module, you will increase your general and specialised vocabulary in German through translation into English and German, essay-writing in German, spoken and listening comprehension, and work on business-related materials. In pursuit of these aims, you will learn to identify and rectify grammatical problems, and gain increased sensitivity towards language in general, and an awareness of register, semantics and style in particular. You will also gain important research skills, including correct use of dictionaries.
Reason, Romantics and Reactions. Germany in the Age of Revolution.
You will get to grips with the emerging sense of German nationhood, against the background of the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars. You will study concepts such as the state, the nation and the classical ideal as an aesthetic and political model through the work of authors such as Goethe, Schiller and Hölderlin, before exploring German Romanticism up to its critical reappraisal in the 19th century. You will develop your appreciation of the role of the artists in the German Weltanschauung and the rise of nationalism to broaden your understanding of how literature reflects different models of progress and anticipates social and political change. See also the link to optional German modules below.
Final Year
Modern German Language 3
In this third-year module, you will use vocabulary of increasing sophistication in both general and specialised fields, and improve your skills in spoken and written German and translation. You will improve your listening and reading comprehension skills, and learn to identify and rectify grammatical problems. An important aim of the course is to cultivate sensitivity towards language in general, and an awareness of register, semantics and style in particular.
The Rise of Capitalist Modernity: Gender, Class, Identity
You will study the evolution of modern German literature, from Poetic Realism, through Naturalism and Modernism across a wide spectrum of authors, genres and themes in dialogue with major social, cultural and political movements that mark the transformation of Germany and Austria from the 1870s onwards. Themes include the Industrial Revolution, social critique and the dramatic form, sexuality, adolescence and education in the Wilhelmine period, gender roles and modernity, and the lead-up and response of German writers to the First World War. You will analyse major literary movements through the work of, among others, Theodor Fontane, Gerhart Hauptmann, Arthur Schnitzler, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann and Georg Kaiser, and appreciate how the arts became a vehicle for expressing ambivalent attitudes to modernity.
Examples of optional modules/options for current students:
- German Culture in the Age of Revolution, 1789-1848
- No Place like Heimat: Narratives of Belonging in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Century
- Film in the Weimar Republic and under National Socialism
- Bertolt Brecht: Theatre as Revolution
- The Strange World of Franz Kafka’s Short Stories
- Violent Women in the German Cultural Imagination
- German Memories of WWII - From Perpetration to Suffering
- The Self and the Others I: Identity, Gender and Ethnicity in German Culture around 1800
- Business and Society in Contemporary Germany
- Germany and the Holocaust: Interpretations and Debates
- German Terror and Cultural Memory
- Gender Trouble in Contemporary German Culture
- Translation Studies modules
^Year Two or Three depending on when the year abroad is taken
Tuition fees
Find out more about fees and funding.
Additional course costs
There may be costs associated with other items or services such as academic texts, course notes, and trips associated with your course. Students who choose to complete a work placement or study abroad will pay reduced tuition fees for their third year.
Warwick Undergraduate Global Excellence Scholarship 2021
We believe there should be no barrier to talent. That's why we are committed to offering a scholarship that makes it easier for gifted, ambitious international learners to pursue their academic interests at one of the UK's most prestigious universities. This new scheme will offer international fee-paying students 250 tuition fee discounts ranging from full fees to awards of £13,000 to £2,000 for the full duration of your Undergraduate degree course.
Find out more about the Warwick Undergraduate Global Excellence Scholarship 2021
Your career
This degree course was only recently introduced, so our first cohort of students have not yet graduated.
However, graduates from other Modern Language courses like this one have gone on to work for employers including:
- Amazon
- British Airways
- Civil Service
- Grayce Consulting
- HM Revenue and Customs
- HSBC
- Ipsos Mori
- Lidl
- NBC Universal
- Save the Children International
- The Department for International Trade
They have pursued careers such as:
- Business and financial project management professionals
- Chartered and certified accountants
- Financial accounts managers
- Human resources and industrial relations officers
- Management consultants and business analysts
- Public services associate professionals
- Teachers and other educational professionals
Helping you find the right career
Our department has a dedicated professionally qualified Senior Careers Consultant to support you. They offer impartial advice and guidance, together with workshops and events throughout the year. Previous examples of workshops and events include:
- What are you doing after Warwick? Career planning for final year language students
- Careers in the Public Sector
- Warwick careers fairs throughout the year
- Completing effective CVs and Application Forms for students from the School of Modern Languages
- Reflecting on Your Year Abroad
- Languages Alumni Evening
"The perfect place"
"Choosing German Studies at Warwick was an easy choice for me. The German Studies modules that Warwick offer are great. I am very interested in German history and culture and Warwick was the perfect place for me to study a course which I am really interested in."
Joe
BA German Studies
"I chose Warwick because I really liked it being a campus university. I like how green it is, and I like the thought of everything being very close together. I come from the countryside, so it's not often I could just walk to the shops and have everything in one place. And also because it's a very high-ranked university, so you know that you're going to get good opportunities if you come here."
Fiona
German Studies BA
About the information on this page
This information is applicable for 2021 entry. Given the interval between the publication of courses and enrolment, some of the information may change. It is important to check our website before you apply. Please read our terms and conditions to find out more.