Dresden's historic reconstructions bring up questions that reach far beyond the city's new/old Neumarkt district. In this thesis, I would like to take a closer look at the current ideological discourse surrounding the reconstruction of destroyed historic buildings in Dresden and other cities in the former DDR. What seems at first to be a simple culture war between progressive and reactionary city planners is actually, I will argue, a unique historical moment that blurs the dogmatically held ideas of rationality and nostalgia, ornament and function, and high art and kitsch. From the uncanny shadow of a church recently raised from the dead, I will explore the aesthetic and ethical ramifications of the technologically reproduced building.

Soviet writer Vasilii Grossman has been renowned in the West as a dissident author of Life and Fate, which multiple sources, including The New York Times have called "arguably the greatest Russian novel of the 20th century." Grossman, however, was not a dissident, but an official state writer attempting to publish for a Soviet audience. Grossman's work was criticized by Soviets as being "too Jewish", while Jewish scholars have called it "not Jewish enough." And, despite his modern critical acclaim, little scholarship on Grossman exists. In my thesis, I explore these paradoxes. I argue that Grossman attempts to reinterpret traditional state ideas of Sovietness into a more inclusive, democratic version by creating heroes from traditionally marginalized groups. To do this, he reinterprets and inverts traditional tropes of the Socialist Realist genre. Genric limitations on his worldview, however, prevent this vision from being completely realized in the course of his work. I trace Grossman's work from his early short fiction to his Khruschev era novels and show how this trope develops during his career as a Soviet writer and citizen.

In this thesis, I explore the representation of Nazis and violence in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds (2009), including how the film proposes justification for violence and murder, and how the film participates in cultural fantasies. The film presents an alternate outcome of World War II in which the Allies achieve victory by assassinating Hitler and the High Command of the Third Reich in a movie theater. The Nazis in the film, far from being a complex enemy, are used for their token villain status. Using the Nazis in this way both participates in and reinterprets the Nazisploitation genre. The protagonists, the clandestine military force known as the "Basterds," which attacks German troops using guerrilla warfare tactics, help make this victory possible. Aldo, their leader, encourages his men to brutalize the Nazis they come in contact with, and Aldo shows the way by carving swastikas in the foreheads of Nazis he allows to live. Tarantino creates an aesthetic surrounding his violence in an attempt to create a paradigm in which murder is imagined to be morally acceptable. Yet the film also supports this paradigm by setting the Nazi up in much the same way cinema uses the zombie, as a killable being, a blank body on which violence can be justifiably enacted. As a blank body, cultural imagination can also be inscribed on the Nazi, using them as a meditation on Jewish revenge fantasy and a fantasy of American revenge against terrorists. In the end, the Basterds become more like Nazi villains than heroes due to their participation in Nazi-like violence. The audience, as well, faces the problem of becoming like Nazis by viewing the film.

Pushing the "Scented Envelope": Elisa von der Recke at the Cultural Crossroads Carrie L. Cox Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages, BYU Master of Arts This thesis serves as an introduction to the 5-volume electronic edition of the collected works of the influential German-language author Elisa von der Recke to be published by the Department of Germanic and Slavic Languages at Brigham Young University. The compilation presents a modern edition of Recke's published writings and letters in German, with an extensive critical apparatus in English, including introductions to the edition, author and individual sections, biographical information, a complete bibliography of primary and secondary works, a photo/portrait gallery, and critical annotations. During her life as an author, traveler, social luminary, and salonnière, Elisa von der Recke (1754-1833) stood at the crossroads of European history and culture. Born into a German-speaking noble family in the Duchy of Courland (now Lithuania), Recke was positioned between the conflicting intellectual discourses of religion and rational Enlightenment; between intellect and sentiment; between the noble class, to which she belonged, and the bourgeoisie, which she preferred; between traditional views of a woman's role, and her own ceaseless intellectual striving. This essay examines the way Recke creatively asserted herself as an individual in spite of the limitations of her time in three main areas. First, I discuss the way that Elisa writes her memoir in an expertly layered style, utilizing her author's voice alternately as both character and narrator. Second, I examine discusses her unconventional education and why it allowed for exceptional opportunities for a woman at her time, and thirdly, I consider Elisa's lifelong search for affection that led her to uniquely constructive avenues atypical of someone so deprived of consistent affection as Elisa had been in her childhood and marriage. Because of Recke's central position in the culture of her time, her writings provide a wealth of insight relevant to gender roles, political, religious and philosophical history, as well as travel and culture. What was unique about Elisa von der Recke, was her quiet refusal to remain within the borders set for her by society, her social status and her gender. Where many women might never have questioned the role they were assigned and its restrictions, and others never found a way to escape them, against all odds, Elisa burst politely through the "scented envelope" that contained her, and literally created herself, her education, her role in society, and her reputation, becoming in the process a truly remarkable woman.

This thesis explores a short drama of Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach, Without Love. It provides not only a complete English translation of the work, but also an interpretative introduction. By first examining the life of Ebner-Eschenbach, I am able to provide insight to the origins of the play. Because Ebner-Eschenbach faced so much opposition in her drama writing career this one act play becomes more relevant. It contains similar themes to her other works such as: gender roles, the role of the aristocracy, and love in marriage. Without Love examines the role of love in marriage by providing the reader with a comedic scenario in which a couple claims to marry without love. While purporting a marriage without love, there is in fact a great deal of love in the play. Love is an enabling power in the story that causes great change in the characters f lives. Ebner-Eschenbach uses love to argue against traditional romantic marriages and lay the pathway for a future where women can reject the patriarchal society and love for themselves. There is however, a distinct irony in the story because the title is after all, Without Love. I propose that love is indeed everywhere throughout the play and that Eschenbach uses this theme to push her own agenda of the modern women in aristocratic societies. Eschenbach writes in both a pre-modern and modern style and uses love to ensure the preservation of her own aristocratic class while advocating for social reform for all classes.

Ann Tizia Leitich wrote about America to a Viennese audience as a foreign correspondent with the unique and personal perspective of an immigrant to the United States. Leitich differentiates herself from other Europeans who reported on America in her day by telling of the life of the average working American. In so doing, Leitich uses her work as a foreign correspondent to create a new identity for Austria between the World Wars. Leitich uses America in the 1920's and 1930's as a cultural mirror in which the new Republic of Austria can see itself. Leitich's perspective of America is not only useful to the German-speaking audiences of her time, but also sheds light on America in the interwar period to readers of all backgrounds. Unfortunately, the influence of Leitich's journalism is currently limited to German-speaking audiences. Included are 31 translations of Leitich's articles for the benefit of English-speaking audiences to assist in further analysis of implications of her work.

An American singing prodigy escapes to Russia following the death of his bandmate and stays after his last close relative – his mother – dies. It’s the late 1990s and he’s found a new home. After a decade in obscurity he makes a comeback by joining a Russian musical collective, but when they embark on a tour during the events in Crimea in 2014, accusations swirl about his past as a democracy promoter for a U.S.-funded NGO in Vladivostok. Condemned by the media as a spy, he’s eventually denounced by Rokko – the man who rediscovered him, mentored him, and became his best friend – a hybrid like him, someone with a toehold in both Russian and American cultures. He returns to the U.S. where he is also viewed warily, for he responds to criticisms of Russia by encouraging a nuanced understanding of the country at a time when there’s no patience for it. He is left without the one thing he’d always searched for: a home.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, the Chechens fought against the Russians for independence. The focus in the literature available has been on the wars and the atrocities caused by the wars. The literature then hypothesizes that the insurgency of today is just a continuation of the past. They do not focus on a major event in Chechen history: the Soviet liquidation of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1944. It is this author’s assertion that the liquidation of the Chechen-Ingush ASSR forever changed the mindset of the people because it fractured a society that was once unified. This project will compare the Chechen insurgency from the beginnings until the deportation and after the deportation. This will allow me to show how the deportation changed the Chechen mindset and disprove the assertion that these two Chechen wars were just a continuation of the past.

This film is an oral history about the intergenerational relationship between three women: my grandmother, my mother, and I. Through our connection I explore the Russian traditions that my grandmother has cultivated and shared among the three of us, in particular, the tradition of fortune telling. I also explore my grandmother's struggle with dementia. Although her memory is fading, she can still remember the practice of reading fortunes and that tradition has preserved our bond and her legacy.

This study investigates one of the Polish language’s most arbitrary cases: the genitive masculine inanimate singular. It collects and ranks several guidelines to help language learners discern its proper usage and also introduces a framework to provide detailed feedback regarding arbitrary cases. The study tests this framework by implementing and evaluating a hybrid grammar checker called PLPrepare. PLPrepare performs similarly to other grammar checkers and is able to detect genitive case usages and provide feedback based on a number of error classifications.