European Studies, Minor

European Studies at Penn is an interdisciplinary minor that trains students to understand European Union institutions and the history and context of their development. It supplements majors in history, political science, sociology and art history as well as in French, German, English, Spanish, Italian and Central and East European languages. It is designed to give students access to:

  • The institutions of a today's Europe—European Union, Council of Europe, European Court of Human Rights—reflecting the largest experiment in building a global system of governance in human history.
  • An understanding of Europe as a historical and cultural entity and its world leadership in business, politics and culture.
  • A great variety of countries, cultures and languages whose interaction with each other and with the United States is an essential part of transatlantic culture.
Minor Requirements
Core Courses1
European Institutions:
The European Union
European History1
Select one of the following:
The Emergence of Modern Europe
Early Modern Europe, 1450-1750
Making and Breaking European Hegemony
Modern Europe, 1789-1919
Economic History of Europe I
The French Revolution and the Origins of Modern Politics
Belief and Unbelief in Modern Thought
Tolstoy’s War and Peace and the Age of Napoleon
World War I
Origins of Nazism: From Democracy to Race War and Genocide
Non-English Language2
Two Courses Beyond Language Requirement, Normally at Advanced Level, in Any Non-English European Language
Advanced French
Advanced French Grammar and Composition
Advanced French Conversation and Composition
Advanced French in Residence
Translating Cultures: Literature on and in Translation
Water Worlds: Cultural Responses to Sea Level Rise & Catastrophic Flooding
Forest Worlds: Mapping the Arboreal Imaginary in Literature and Film
Liquid Histories and Floating Archives
Sustainability & Utopianism
Global Sustainabilities
Advanced Italian I
Advanced Italian II
Business Italian
Business Italian: Italian for Special Purposes
Business Italian: Italian for Professions
Business Italian: Translation and Interpreting
Russian Society Today
Russia Society Today II
Advanced Spanish
Advanced Spanish for the Medical Professions
Business Spanish I
Business Spanish II
Advanced Spanish II: Grammar and Composition
Spanish for the Professions
European Electives2
Select 2 course units from the following list:
Other European History Classes Listed Above May Be Used as Electives
Other European studies courses not listed here may be credited at advisor discretion.
Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian I
Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian II
Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian III
Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian IV
Freud: The Invention of Psychoanalysis
Marx, Marxism, and the Culture of Revolution
Nietzsche's Modernity and the Death of God
Fascist Cinemas
German Cinema
Literature of Dissent: Art as Protest in 20th-Century Poland and Czechoslovakia
Machiavelli and Modern Political Thought
Czech Through Film
Czech I
Czech through Short Stories
Czech II
Czech III
Czech IV
French History and Culture to 1774
French History and Culture 1789-1945
Masterpieces of French Cinema
Perspectives in French Literature: Love and Passion
Perspectives in French Literature: The Individual and Society
Francophone Literature and Film
French for Business I
French Phonetics
Paris during the German Occupation and its Places of [Non-]Memory
Contemporary France
The Novel and Marriage
French Identity in the Twentieth Century
Topics in French Culture
Literary History
French Thought After 1968
French for Business II
France and the European Union
Advanced French: Translation
Le français dans le monde/French in the World
Medieval Literature
The Enlightenment
French Literature of the 19th Century
Literature of the Twentieth Century
Animal Words, Animal Worlds: Introduction to Zoopoetics
Horror Cinema
French & Italian Modern Horror
The French Novel of the Twentieth Century
Modern French Theater
Paris in Film
France and Its Others
Euro Zone Crisis - The EU in a Currency War for Suvival?
Babylon Berlin: German Crime Books
Politics of Commemoration
Freud: The Invention of Psychoanalysis
Freud's Objects
Marx, Marxism, and the Culture of Revolution
Nietzsche's Modernity and the Death of God
Berlin: History, Politics, Culture
Metropolis: Culture of the City
The Fantastic and Uncanny in Literature: Ghosts, Spirits & Machines
Fascist Cinemas
German Cinema
Jewish Films and Literature
Queer German Cinema
Comparative Cultures of Sustainability
Comparative Cultures of Resilience and Sustainability in the Netherlands and the United States
Is Europe Facing a Spiritual Crisis?
Topics German Cinema
Northern Renaissance Art
Global Modernism Seminar
Origins of Nazism: From Democracy to Race War and Genocide
Business German: A Macro Perspective
Business German: A Micro Perspective
Topics in Dutch Studies
Handschrift-Hypertext: Deutsche Medien
Places of Memory. Lieux de memoire. Erinnerungsorte.
Krautrock und die Folgen
Seeing Green: Environmentalism in Germany and Austria
German Youth Cultures
Writing in Dark Times: German Literature
German Ideas and Nazi Ideology
Crime and Detection - Dark Deeds
Theater and Language: Staging the 20th Century
Topics in German Literature
Kafka's Creatures
German Literature after 1945
Critical Theory of Christa Wolf: What remains?
Decadence
Topics in German Culture
Schelling, Goethe, Nature. Thinking Nature with Schelling and Goethe.
The Trouble with Freud: Psychoanalysis, Literature, Culture
Putin's Russia
The Enlightenment
Modern Britain, 1700-present: Empire, Industry and Democracy
England and the British Isles to 1707
The Rise and Fall of the Russian Empire, 1552-1917
The Soviet Century, 1917-1991
Freud: The Invention of Psychoanalysis
Berlin: History, Politics, Culture
Hungarian I
Portraits of Russian Society: Art, Fiction, Drama
Russia and the West
Portraits of Soviet Society: Literature, Film, Drama
Foundations of European Thought: from Rome to the Renaissance
Foundations of Law
Hungarian II
Independent Study in Hungarian
Hungarian III
Hungarian IV
Florence in History
The City of Rome: From Constantine to the Borgias
Food and Diet in Early Europe: Farm to Table in the Renaissance
Cultura E Letteratura
Black Italy: Transnational Identities and Narratives in Afro-Italian Literature
Introduction to Italian Cinema
Contemporary Italy: Pop Culture, Politics, and Peninsular Identity
Modern Italian Culture
Titian and Venetian Painting
Caravaggio
Michelangelo and the Art of the Italian Renaissance
Italian Theater
Palermo: Urban Migration, the Built Environment, and Global Justice
Historical Eras and Topics: Earlier Periods
The Holocaust in Italian Literature and Film
Dante's Divine Comedy
BFS--Med/Red Dante in English: Creative Responses to the Divine Comedy
Contemporary Italy
Italian Film and Media Studies
Race and Ethnicity in Italy
Italian Gender Studies
Italian Fashion
Italian Visual Studies
Italian Foods and Cultures
Italian Literature
Italian Innovations
Italian Renaissance Studies
Mediterranean Studies
Italian Performance Studies
Italian Science and Philosophy
Italian Material Studies
Italian Digital Humanities
Boccaccio
Machiavelli
Petrarch
Italian Music
ITALIAN HISTORIES
Contemporary Italy
Italian Film and Media Studies
Race and Ethnicity in Italy
Italian Gender Studies
Italian Fashion
Italian Visual Studies
Italian Foods and Cultures
Italian Literature
Italian Innovations
Italian Renaissance Studies
Mediterranean Studies
Italian Performance Studies
Italian Science and Philosophy
Italian Material Studies
Italian Digital Humanities
Boccaccio
Machiavelli
Petrarch
Italian Music
Italian Histories
Writing About Art Seminar
Caravaggio Seminar
Renaissance Europe
French & Italian Modern Horror
Independent Study
Religions of the West
Beginning Yiddish I
Beginning Yiddish II
Themes Jewish Tradition: Iberian Conversos: Jew-Christian?
Readings in Modern Yiddish Literature
Reading Benjamin Reading Kafka
Composers: Verdi and Shakespeare
Composers: Mozart/DaPonte
Composers: Fryderyk Chopin
Composers: Ludwig van Beethoven
History of Opera
Introduction to European Art Music
Marx's Moral, Social, and Political Philosophy
Kant I
Kant II
Hegel
Polish I
Polish II
Polish for Heritage Speakers I
Polish III
Polish IV
Polish for Heritage Speakers II
Christian Thought From 1000 to 1800
Sacred Stuff in Medieval & Early Modern Europe
Portraits of Soviet Society: Literature, Film, Drama
Putin's Russia: Culture, Society and History
Prague: The Making of a European Nation
Europe: From an Idea to the Union
The Socialist City
Russia and the West
The Soviet Century, 1917-1991
Masterpieces of 19th-Century Russian Literature
Masterpieces of 20th-Century Russian Literature
Russian Short Story
Literature of Dissent: Art as Protest in 20th-Century Poland and Czechoslovakia
Dostoevsky
Tolstoy
Behind the Iron Curtain
War and Representation
Russian and East European Film from the October Revolution to World War II
Cold War: Global History
Tolstoy’s War and Peace and the Age of Napoleon
Chekhov: Stage & Screen
Communism
Socialism
Russian Politics
Russia and Eastern Europe in International Affairs
Soviet and Post-Soviet Economy
Population and Public Health in Eastern Europe
Sex and Socialism
Foundations of Spanish Culture and Civilization
Studies in the Spanish Middle Ages
Don Quijote
Studies in Spanish Literature and Culture: 1700-Present
The Evolution of the Don Juan Myth in the Western Literary Tradition
The Spanish Short Story
The Gothic Tradition in Spanish Literature
Studies in Modern and Contemporary Spanish Literature
The Generation of 1898
Spanish Post-Franco Narrative by Women
Studies in Modern and Contemporary Spanish Culture
The Spanish Avant-Garde
Spanish Surrealism: The Works of Salvador Dalí
Elementary Swedish I
Elementary Swedish II
Intermediate Swedish I
Intermediate Swedish II
Ukrainian I
Ukrainian II
Ukrainian III
Ukrainian IV
Beginning Yiddish I
Beginning Yiddish II
Intermediate Yiddish I
Intermediate Yiddish II
Readings in Modern Yiddish Literature
Composers: Opera Composers 1600-1900
Composers: Mozart/DaPonte
Film Music in Post 1950 Italy
Masterpieces-Italian Literature
Total Course Units6

The degree and major requirements displayed are intended as a guide for students entering in the Fall of 2023 and later. Students should consult with their academic program regarding final certifications and requirements for graduation.