Alumni

Recent Alumni News

Tribute to Rosalie

Tribute to Rosalie Motz Russell

Ida Rosalie Motz Russell was born in Bessarabia, then lived in Poland with her parents and two brothers. They had to flee to Germany, and after the war emigrated to Canada. She attended the University of British Columbia before coming to the University of Washington (as Rosalie “Lee” Wright), completing her Master’s degree in German in 1970, and her PhD in 1978. Her dissertation, “Poetic Consciousness in Günter Kunert's Prose,” is obtainable through the UW Library. Prior to finishing the… Read more
Alex Minami

Alumni Update: Alex Minami, Seattle Opera

Opera 101 at SEATTLEOPERA.ORG begins November 7! In this six-part beginner’s guide series, join Associate Director of Community Engagement Lokela Alexander Minami for lively and informative multimedia presentations that will help you make sense of this larger-than-life art form by giving you some essential terms and taking you on a listening tour of some of the most… Read more
Manfred Bansleben

In Memoriam: Professor Manfred Bansleben (1941-2022)

The German Studies Department mourns the loss of our beloved friend and colleague, Manfred Bansleben. Manfred passed unexpectedly on December 1, 2022, after a brief bout with pneumonia, just one day before his eighty-first birthday. For over 20 years, Manfred was the creative and organizational force behind the German Department’s highly successful language program. As German Language Program Coordinator and TA Supervisor, he trained generations of graduate student teaching assistants in… Read more
miah robert on a fulbright in dresden

News from our Alums: Miah Robert (BA 2022)

Greetings from Dresden, Germany! Since graduating in June with a B.S. in speech and hearing sciences and a B.A. in linguistics and Germanics, I have moved 5,000 miles away to my new home in Dresden, Germany. I was fortunate to find a wonderful apartment in the Löbtau area with three fantastic roommates who have quickly become good friends. A few trips to IKEA and a number of EBay Kleinanzeigen purchases later and I am finally feeling settled.  As an English Teaching Assistant in the… Read more
Richard Sperber

News from our Alums: Richard Sperber (PhD 1995)

Greetings from Carthage College in Kenosha, Wisconsin where I have been teaching all levels of German and Spanish not long after graduating from the Department of Comparative Literature. In the Modern Languages Department, we do not primarily teach literary history or literary scholarship but combine textual comprehension with cultural competency and language proficiency. Skills development culminates in skills integration in our capstone course, an independent research project. Feedback and… Read more
sam romanelli

Graduate Student Update: Sam Romanelli

My name is Sam Romanelli, and I am a returning student to UW. I finished my undergraduate degree in 2016, and now I am back for a Masters program. I am starting my year off with Professor Oehme's Seminar in Medieval German Literature, a reading course with Professor Wiggins, and a mentorship in Professor Wiggins' German 120 class. This quarter I will be co-hosting a film series with my fellow graduate student Hannah Bradley Kondo on Jewish life in Germany. Anyone who is… Read more
Japhet Johnstone

News from our Alums: Japhet Johnstone (PhD 2016)

When I started working at Freie Universität Berlin in 2019, I was tasked with setting up a translation office that could provide language services for the entire university. That was quite a tall order, but things quickly got rolling during my first year in the new position: We implemented a translation software package to manage projects. I was able to advertise two positions for staff translators. Requests for translations were coming in from all corners of the university. Then, the pandemic… Read more
Peter Neurath

In Memory of Peter Neurath

Peter Neurath November 3, 1942 - June 6, 2021 Peter F. Neurath, 78, a reporter for the Puget Sound Business Journal for 30 years, died of kidney failure on June 6. The son of Dr. Hans Neurath and Hilde Bial-Neurath, Peter was born in 1942 in Durham, N.C., where his father was professor of biochemistry at Duke University. In 1950 the family moved to Seattle where Hans chaired the newly formed biochemistry department in the University of Washington's Medical School, a position he held for 25… Read more
Ayoub, Phillip M. ‘Author Response.’ in “Dialogue: When States Come Out?”:

News from our Alums: Phillip Ayoub

I have such fond memories of my time at the University of Washington, where I majored in European Studies and minored in German. Those experiences, from German Film Noir, to a course (and performance) on Brecht's The Threepenny Opera, to my classes on German Politics have shaped much about how I think about European politics in my current career as a political scientist. Beyond studying the language, the ideas that percolated… Read more
sabine wilke

Congratulations to the Class of 2020 - 2021!

Convocation Program Thursday, June 10, 2021 3:00 p.m. Online Meeting Link   Welcome Professor Sabine Wilke Department Chair Graduation Address Elena Simms Deputy Consul of Germany, SF Consulate General   Graduation of Class of 2021 Professor Jason Groves   Graduation of MAs and PhDs… Read more
Share