Kanon und Weltliteratur in der Literaturdidaktik: Deutschsprachiger und US-amerikanischer Diskurs im Vergleich
Canon and world literature: comparing German and US-American discourses on literary education

Summary/Abstract: From the late 1960s to the early 2000s, questions of canonization formed one of the central issues of “Deutschdidaktik”, which is the German phrase for the scholarly approach to teaching German language and literature. Within the didactic debate on canon, however, teaching world literature was widely neglected. Instead, the canon debate mainly focused on teaching contemporary literature, children and youth literature, and functional literature. When addressing world literature, “Deutschdidaktik” omitted the discussion of fundamental issues of the canon. Things are very different within the US-American discourse. The discussions about teaching world literature and about how to redefine the canon are strongly intertwined. This essay compares the developments within the German and the US-American discourse. It will discuss the reasons for divergent settings of priorities in both canon debates. The essay concludes by suggesting a more intensive dialogue between American and German pedagogic discourse. It also states the need for a stronger intertwining of literary studies and studies of literary education within the German discourse, mainly through an application of postcolonial theorems on literary education.

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