Winnetou

“A German Board Game & the Need for New Stories," by Dr. Lars Richter

Lori Straus — Thu, 07 Oct 2021 18:20:17 +0000

“A German Board Game & the Need for New Stories," by Dr. Lars Richter Lori Straus Thu, 10/07/2021 - 14:20

This event has passed to watch the recording please visit our website.

In 2018, German board game manufacturer dlp games released Manitoba, a strategy game where players take the role of “different clans of the Cree Indians” (Pranzo and Conzadori 14). The representation of Cree culture in the game’s manual and artwork—replete with totem poles, canoes, axe-wielding warriors, and wise-looking spiritual leaders—raises serious concerns about misrepresentation, cultural appropriation, and racism. When faced with criticism of stereotyping the Cree in a CBC news article in September 2018, the game’s designer responded defensively by stating that, in fiction, it is “impossible not to simplify” and that his co-editor simply “liked the sound of the word ‘Manitoba’” (“A Totem Pole”).

In line with the critique sketched out above, I propose an analysis of Manitoba as a cultural product indicative of German’s long-standing “Indianthusiasm.” Furthermore, the analysis will show that the game as a material object, when received on treaty territory, takes on a will of its own. Using Sara Ahmed’s notion of “willful objects” that do “not allow subjects to carry out their will” (42), I argue that playing the game Manitoba in Manitoba challenges and eludes the intention of its authors, thus opening up possibilities for more critical and thoughtful readings that do not merely sound good in name but instead consider the land on which we live, work, and play.

About Lars Richter

Lars Richter is a settler scholar-teacher and faculty member in the Department of German and Slavic Studies at the University of Manitoba, which is located on original lands of Anishinaabeg, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota, and Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Métis Nation. He studied at Freie Universität in Berlin, Washington University in St. Louis, and earned his PhD in German Languages and Literatures from the University of Alberta with a dissertation on Juli Zeh. His primary fields of research and teaching are twentieth and twenty-first century German literature and culture, the intersection of Indigenous and German Studies, popular culture, gender, and ecocriticism.

This event was made possible in part with support from the WCGS's Diversity and Inclusion Grant.

"Winnetou, White Innocence, and Settler Time," by Dr. Maureen Gallagher

Lori Straus — Tue, 05 Oct 2021 18:46:07 +0000

"Winnetou, White Innocence, and Settler Time," by Dr. Maureen Gallagher Lori Straus Tue, 10/05/2021 - 14:46

This event has passed please visit our website for a recording.

Proclaiming “every generation has its Winnetou,” German network RTL ushered in the return of Winnetou to German television with a big-budget film trilogy, Winnetou–Der Mythos Lebt. This talk analyzes this 2016 Winnetou film trilogy in dialogue with the 1960s West German westerns and Karl May’s original 1893 novel using concepts from settler colonial studies, Indigenous studies, and critical race theory to show how Winnetou centers whiteness. In the new Winnetou, full of nostalgic call-backs to the 1960s film westerns, the blood brotherhood relationship between white German Old Shatterhand and Mescalero Apache Winnetou becomes a way of forging connections not only across cultures but across temporal lines, allowing for the imposition of settler time onto Indigenous persons and the erasure of Indigenous sovereignty and survival. Understanding the blood brotherhood within Winnetou as a kind of settler adoption fantasy allows us to understand how Winnetou centers a narrative of German innocence and reinscribes fantasies of white conquest in the American West.

About Maureen O. Gallagher

Maureen O. Gallagher is a Lecturer in German Studies at Australian National University. She holds an MA from the University of Nebraska and a PhD in German Studies from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her research interests in German Studies are in the areas of gender studies, critical race theory and critical whiteness studies, and postcolonialism and decolonization. Recent publications have focused on inclusive and decolonial pedagogy, race and gender in German colonial literature, and First World War literature, and she is currently working on a book manuscript on whiteness in Wilhelmine German youth literature and culture based on her dissertation, which was awarded the 2016 Women in German dissertation prize. She is also on the authoring team of the online, open access German curriculum Grenzenlos Deutsch, which has been supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

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This event was made possible in part with support from the WCGS's Diversity and Inclusion Grant.

Reading Group Fall 2017: Winnetou, by Karl May

Lori Straus — Tue, 03 Oct 2017 13:17:17 +0000

Reading Group Fall 2017: Winnetou, by Karl May Lori Straus Tue, 10/03/2017 - 09:17

We're going back to the Wild West, German style, with Karl May's Winnetou I (1893) and the Brubacher House.

We'll begin the evening with a short tour of the historic, Mennonite home and then sit down for our book discussion in its stone-walled basement, next to a cozy fire.

Because the book is no longer subject to copyright protection, you can download English and German digital copies for free. Hard copies are easy to come by at major online bookstores if you prefer to have a book in your hand.

Please RSVP by November 15 to confirm your spot. However, don't wait too long - RSVPs are accepted on a first come, first served basis, and spaces are limited. Free parking is available on the lot beside the home, or across the street at OpenText.

If you can't make it to this meeting but wish to stay informed about upcoming ones, sign up to our reading-group-only email list. You'll be able to offer input into upcoming titles and meeting dates and be among the first to hear about the finalized details.

For any questions, please contact the Centre. We hope to see you out!