Autoreninformation

Cornelius Partsch is a native of Landstuhl and grew up in the nearby Saarland in southwestern Germany. He is Professor of German in the Department of Modern & Classical Languages at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington. In 2013, the German Section at WWU was recognized as a National Center of Excellence by the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG), an honor given to only two programs in the United States each year.

He received his M. A. and his Ph. D. from Brown University (RI) and, before his appointment at Western Washington, taught German language and culture at Hamilton College (NY), Colby College (ME), Smith College (MA), and Mount Holyoke College (MA). In addition to teaching summer courses at his own institution, he has repeatedly held appointments at three of the most well-known German summer immersion programs in the United States, the Deutsche Sommerschule am Pazifik (Portland State University), the Deutsche Sommerschule am Atlantik (University of Rhode Island), and the Middlebury Language Schools (Middlebury College, VT).

He is the author of Schräge Töne. Jazz und Unterhaltungsmusik in der Kultur der Weimarer Republik (Stuttgart: Metzler, 2000) and has published on various aspects of 20th- and 21st-century German popular culture. He has also worked as a translator. His particular interest in language pedagogy lies in curriculum design, assessment techniques, and the teaching of culture using film, music, and fiction. He has been the recipient of funding from the Goethe Institute, the German Academic Exchange Service, the American Association of Teachers of German, and the German Embassy in Washington D.C. He served as a teacher/trainer in the Goethe Institute's trainer network for the western United States from 2007-2011, and is currently Ortslektor for the German Academic Exchange Service. He is co-author of two recent editions of the well-known elementary-level German textbook Treffpunkt Deutsch. Sixth Edition (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall, 2012) and Treffpunkt Deutsch. Seventh Edition (New York: Pearson, 2019). This book has just been transferred to a new company, LingroLearning.