Researching the work of living writers and poets of German
The Centre for Contemporary German Culture (CCGC) produces world-class research on the literature and culture of twentieth - and twenty-first century Germany, Austria and German-speaking Switzerland. The Centre is unique to Wales and makes an important contribution to German Studies in Britain, Europe and North America. It aims to promote and stimulate further research on the work of contemporary German-language authors and film-makers in the English-speaking world.
The Centre hosts a writer-in-residence programme, research seminars and conferences, and has two dedicated publication series: 'Contemporary German Writers and Film-makers' and the ‘Leeds-Swansea Colloquia on Contemporary German Literature’. Its academic members have supervised several PhDs over the two and a half decades of the Centre’s existence, and have secured considerable research funding, particularly from the AHRC Research Leave scheme.
The CCGC is home to a number of projects, including work by Professor Julian Preece, Dr Cristian Cercel and the Steidl Verlag (Göttingen) on the volume Günter Grass, Unkenrufe. Kommentare und Materialien. Günter Grass by Julian Preece was published in 2018 by Reaction Books in their Critical Lives series.
We have recently supervised a PhD on Herta Müller and contributed to the supervision of two comparative projects with a strong contemporary German component, both of which are funded by the AHRC: European Extreme Cinema; and European Travellers to Wales.
The Centre welcomes PhD and MA by Research applications in all areas involving contemporary German culture, especially literature and film. Funding is available for well-qualified candidates.
The History of CCGC
The Centre for Contemporary German Literature was founded in 1993 under the directorship of Professor Rhys Williams and dedicated itself to researching the work of living writers and poets of German. Over the next fifteen years it hosted fifteen visiting writers, including the 2009 Nobel Laureate Herta Müller, whose work became the subject of specially produced volumes published by University of Wales Press. In 2008 the directorship passed to Professor Julian Preece and the designation changed to the Centre for Contemporary German Culture in order to encompass film as well as literature.
