Winder McConnell

Winder McConnell

Professor of German
(Ph.D., University of Kansas)

Email: wamcconnell@ucdavis.edu
Office: 407 Sproul Hall
Office Hours

Mailing Address:
Department of German
209 Sproul Hall
University of California, Davis
Davis, CA 95616


Winder McConnell studied German literature and modern German history as an undergraduate at McGill University, from which he graduated in 1967 with honors in both disciplines. His graduate work in medieval German literature was completed in 1973 under the direction of Professor Ernst S. Dick at the University of Kansas. He has taught at a Gymnasium in Germany, Stanford University, the Johns Hopkins University, the University of Stirling, Scotland, and at the University of California, Santa Barbara (summer program). Professor McConnell has been on the faculty of the University of California, Davis, for over thirty-one years, eighteen and a half of which as Chair of the Department of German and Russian. He is currently Director of the Teaching Resources Center on the Davis campus. In 1997, he was honored by the Heinrich-Heine Universität in Düsseldorf, Germany, for his contributions to scholarship in medieval German literature and his role in helping to establish an exchange program between that University and UC Davis. In summer 2000, he established a Summer Abroad Program for UC and non-UC students at the Heinrich-Heine Universität focusing on “National Socialist Aesthetics,” which he ran successfully for eight summers. Together with his daughter, he edited a Festschrift for Ernst S. Dick that was presented to the Jubilar at the University of Kansas on the occasion of his eightieth birthday in April, 2009. He is currently working on a book that focuses on “Otherworlds” in medieval German literature and the transformation of heroes who enter such worlds. A second project involves an annotated English translation, with interpretation, of the highly complex, anonymous, fourteenth-century allegorical Middle High German poem Die Minneburg.

Research Interests

Medieval German literature; Jungian interpretations of medieval literature; the concept of the "Otherworld" in literature; the transformation of the hero through time; translation of Middle High German texts

Academic Positions

  • 1973-74, Ausländische Lehrkraft, Hannoversch Münden, BRD
  • 1974-76, Teaching and Research Fellow, Stanford University
  • 1976-78, Assistant Professor, Johns Hopkins University
  • 1978-82, Assistant Professor, University of California, Davis
  • 1982-88, Associate Professor, University of California, Davis
  • 1984-90, Chair, Department of German and Russian, University of California, Davis
  • 1988-Present, Professor, University of California, Davis
  • Summer 1990, Acting Director, Summer Institute of German Language and Culture, University of California, Santa Barbara
  • 1990-91, Visiting Professor of German, University of Stirling, Stirling, Scotland
  • 1993-95, Chair, Department of German and Russian, University of California, Davis
  • 1996-98, Director, Medieval Studies Program, University of California, Davis
  • 1998-2008, Chair, Department of German and Russian, University of California, Davis
  • 2000-02, Director, Medieval Studies Program, University of California, Davis
  • 2003-08, Director, Russian Program, University of California, Davis
  • 2009-Present, Director, Teaching Resources Center, University of California, Davis

Recent Publications

  • “Die Religion im Nibelungenlied und im Nibelungen-Gedicht At the Birth of an Age des kalifornischen Dichters Robinson Jeffers.“ In: Von Mythen und Mären. Mittelalterliche Kulturgeschichte im Spiegel einer Wissenschaftler-Biographie.Festschrift für Otfrid Ehrismann zum 65. Geburtstag. Ed. Gudrun Marci-Boehncke and Jörg Riecke. Hildesheim, Zürich, New York: Olms, 2006. Pp. 291-306.
  • “Die Hoegni-Gestalt des kalifornischen Dichters Robinson Jeffers. Ein Beitrag zur Nibelungen-Rezeption“. In: Wort und wîse, singen unde sagen. Festschrift für Ulrich Müller zum 65. Geburtstag. Ed. Ingrid Bennewitz. Göppinger Arbeiten zur Germanistik 741. Göppingen: Kümmerle, 2007. Pp. 265-274. (With Tina Boyer)
  • “Ambivalent Thoughts in Medieval German Literature. Some Reflections on the Concept of MHG ‘gedanc.’ Germanic Notes and Reviews 39 (No. 2, Fall 2008): 5-21. (With Tina Boyer)
  • ‘Er ist ein wol gevriunder man. Essays in Honor of Ernst S. Dick on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday. Hildesheim, Zurich, New York: Olms Verlag, 2009. X + 395 pp. (Edited with Karen McConnell)
  • “Does the Nibelungenlied have a Message?” In: Er ist ein wol gevriunder man. Essays in Honor of Ernst S. Dick on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday. Hildesheim, Zurich, New York: Olms Verlag, 2009. Pp. 260-273.

Honors and Awards

Ehrenmedaille der Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, 1997 (Medal of Honor)

Teaching Fields/Courses Taught

Various graduate seminars on:

  • Medieval German Heroic Epic
  • Courtly Romance
  • Spielmannsepik
  • Medieval Manuscripts

Undergraduate courses (selection):

  • Chivalry
  • The Medieval Hero
  • The Origins of Romantic Love
  • The Young Goethe
  • Survey of Medieval Literature
  • Germany under the Third Reich (National Socialist Aesthetics)
  • The Western Film (for Humanities/Film Studies)