Bruce Duncan

The Dartmouth Professor of German Language Emeritus

Bruce Duncan, the Dartmouth Professor of German Language emeritus, retired in June, 2015, after 46 years of teaching at the college.

He studied at Williams College and Cornell (Ph.D. 1969), as well as at the University of Munich and the Free University of Berlin. He received fellowships from the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the NDEA, DAAD, and ACLS, and in the fall of 1973 he taught as a guest professor at the University of Cincinnati.

Chair of German Studies at various times, including from 1980-89, he also served as Associate Dean for the Humanities from 1989-93 and for 18 months as Acting Director of the Hopkins Center for the Performing Arts. At the time of his retirement, the Dean of Faculty Office awarded him the Robert A. Fish 1918 Memorial Prize for his contributions to undergraduate teaching.

His literary research centers on German literature of the 18th and 19th centuries and includes articles on Achim von Arnim, Gellert, Gerstenberg, Goethe, Gottsched, E. T. A. Hoffmann, J. M. R. Lenz, Lessing, Schiller, Weiße, and topics of intellectual history. His Lovers, Paracides, and Highwaymen: Aspects of Sturm und Drang Drama appeared in 1999, and Goethe's Werther and the Critics was published in 2005 as part of the Camden House series Literary Criticism in Perspective.

His translations include Achim von Arnim's Novellas of 1812 (published in 1997) and Luise Gottsched's Der Witzling (1990).

Since 1970 he has been developing and writing about programs for computer-assisted teaching and learning, and in 1972 he composed an experimental textbook for German language instruction that utilized his computer drills. These efforts were supported by the Culpeper, Sears, and Sloan Foundations, as well the NSF, the Consortium for Language Teaching and Learning, and the Dartmouth Venture Fund. In his retirement, he continues to develop and add to his online applications: A German Grammar Review, annotext, and DartDrill.

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Contact

Bruce.Duncan@Dartmouth.EDU

603-646-2408

HB 6084

Education

B.A. Williams College
University of Munich
Free University of Berlin
M.A. Cornell University
Ph.D. Cornell University

Selected Publications

German Grammar Review (www.dartmouth.edu/~deutsch/Grammatik/Grammatik.html). Ongoing.

DartDrill (https://dartdrill.dartmouth.edu). Ongoing.

annotext (https://annotext.dartmouth.edu/). Ongoing.
"E.T.A. Hoffmann and Schwester Monika: A Stylometric Analysis," with J. Daniel Kim and Joel Levine. Mitteilungen der E.T.A. Hoffmann-Gesellschaft, 19 (2011): 113-124.
Goethe's Werther and the Critics. (Rochester: Camden House, 2005).
"Sturm und Drang Passions and Eighteenth Century Psychology," in The Camden House History of German Literature, Vol. 6: Sturm und Drang, ed. David D. Hill (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 2002) pp. 46-68.

"Remembering Schiller: The Centenary of 1859," Seminar 35 (1999): 1-22.
"Lovers, Parricides and Highwaymen": Aspects of Sturm und Drang Drama. (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1999).
Ludwig Achim von Arnim's Novellas of 1812: Isabella of Egypt; Melück Maria Blainville; The Three Loving Sisters and the Lucky Dyer; and Angelika the Genoese and Cosmus the Tightrope-Walker [translation] (Lewiston: Mellen, 1997). Pp. 203 + xi.
"'Doch ein Begriff muß bei dem Worte sein:' Teaching Literature with an Electronically-Annotated Text." With Otmar Foelsche. Die Unterrichtspraxis, 28 (1995): 46-51.
"Some Common Themes in Sturm und Drang Reception," in Momentum Dramaticum. Aufsätze zu Ehren von Eckehard Catholy, ed. Linda Dietrick and David G. John (Waterloo, Ontario: Univ. of Waterloo Press, 1990): 149-160.
Luise Adelgunde Gottsched, The Witling (= Der Witzling), translated together with selected letters. In Bitter Healing: German Women Authors, 1700-1830, ed. Jeannine Blackwell and Susanne Zantop (Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press, 1990), pp. 79-117.
"Werke von und über Achim von Arnim seit Volker Hoffmanns 'Die Arnim-Forschung 1945-1972'," in Neue Tendenzen der Arnim-Forschung, ed. Roswitha Burwick and Bernd Fischer (Bern: Lang, 1990): 289-307.
"Werther's Reflections on the Tenth of May," Exile and Enlightenment. Studies in Honor of Guy Stern (Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1987): 1-10.
"CALL for the Macintosh," CALICO Journal, 3, (1985): 11-15. With Robert Blake.
"'An Worte läßt sich trefflich glauben.' Die Sprache der Luise Millerin," in Friedrich Schiller. Kunst, Humanität und Politik in der späten Aufklärung, ed. Wolfgang Wittkowski (Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1982): 26-32.
"'Emilia Galotti lag auf dem Tisch aufgeschlagen:' Werther as (Mis-)Reader," Goethe Yearbook, 1 (1982): 40-49.
"Die Versöhnung in der Sommerfrische. Eine ungedruckte Erzählung Achim von Arnims," Aurora, 40 (1980): 100-146.
"Fate and Coincidence in Arnim's Seltsames Begegnen und Wiedersehen," Seminar, 15 (1979): 181-189.
"The Implied Reader in Lessing's Theory of Comedy," Lessing Yearbook, 10 (1978): 35-45.
"'Ich Pflanze!' Gerstenberg's Ugolino and the Mid-Life Crisis," Germanic Review, 53 (1978): 13-19.
"The Comic Structure of Lenz's Soldaten," Modern Language Notes (German Issue, 1976): 515-523.
"An Experimental Course in German," Schatzkammer, 2 (1976): 9-17.
"Some Correspondences between Arnim's Majoratsherren and Fichte's Concept of the Ich," Monatshefte, 68 (1976): 51-59.
"A 'Cool Medium' as Social Corrective: J. M. R. Lenz's Concept of Comedy," Colloquia Germanica, (1975): 47-60.
German for Fun and Prophet, Hanover: Kiewit, 1974. An experimental text for beginning German, supplemented by tapes and computer drills. Pp. 168.
"The Marchese's Story in Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre," Seminar, 8 (October, 1972): 169-180.
"Hand, Heart, and Language in Minna von Barnhelm," Seminar, 8 (March, 1972): 15-31.

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