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Welcome to the WCGS

The Waterloo Centre for German Studies is a research institute at the University of Waterloo. Funded by private donations, the WCGS supports research into all aspects of the German-speaking world, and is committed to publicly-oriented scholarship. We facilitate the communication of German studies research, distribute awards to students wishing to study in Germany, and organize cultural programming for the university and wider communities.

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Research

Read about the German studies research that we support.

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WCGS Book Prize

Read about the WCGS Book Prize, established in 2018.

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Student Awards

Read about the award opportunities for students in German studies.

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Culture + Diversity

Find links to German events online and resources for diversity and inclusion.

News

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Friday, February 20, 2026

The Diefenbaker Lectures

The Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies is hosting a series of lectures to celebrate the Diefenbaker Memorial Chair of German Literary Studies, an endowed research and public engagement professorship at the University of Waterloo. Leading scholars will be demonstrating the breadth and range of German studies today.

Three lectures will be taking place in March and April:

  • Thursday, March 5, 2026 - Priscilla Layne (University of North Caroline at Chapel HIll): Swiss Postcolonial Literature? Reading Martin Dean's Meine Väter (2003) Through Trauma, Mutism, and Third Space
  • Thursday, March 26, 2026 - Hannah Eldridge (University of Wisconsin-Madison): The (Germanophone) Poem and the (Connected) World
  • Monday, April 6, 2026 - Anjeana Hans (Wellesley College): From Vienna to Hollywood: Independent Films, Exile, and the Shaping of Hollywood Genre

This series is being held in conjunction with the Waterloo Centre for German Studies. For more information on the lectures, please visit The Diefenbaker Lectures website.

Monday, June 23, 2025

Call for Contributions - Seminar

For this seminar, we propose investigating how contemporary German culture reflects and responds to current discourses on democracy at a time when democratic systems across the globe are under pressure, debate is increasingly polarized and the necessary exchange between civil society and the political system is deteriorating. 

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