Wesley Lim - wesley.b.lim@vanderbilt.edu

Originally from San Antonio, TX, I attended Emory University in Atlanta where I received a BBA in Finance and IT with a minor in Dance. I participated fully in the dance program taking classes and choreographing for the Emory Dance Company. I worked at the Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt as an IT intern and later taught ESL in Japan, an experience that sparked my interest in teaching. I switched to German after a renewed interest in the subject and started at Vanderbilt Fall of 2005. My interests are in 19th and 20th century German literature, and I am particularly interested in how dance is portrayed in German literature, German modern dance, and dance aesthetics. After studying abroad at the Free University in Berlin, I completed my masters with a thesis entitled “Der Tanz – ein anregendes Phänomen für das moderne Individuum” which explores the theme of dance in the works of R.M. Rilke and Robert Müller. Last year I also was the German Hall Coordinator in the language program at McTyeire International House at Vanderbilt University, and this year I am the International Interests Hall Coordinator and teach German 101.

In my research I have discovered a connection between the city space of the metropolis around 1900, specific dance scenes that occur within these spaces, and the description and aesthetic experiences of the narrators. In my dissertation I will analyze poems, journal entries, novels, and theoretical and newspaper articles of Rainer Maria Rilke, Alfred Döblin, Elsa Lasker-Schüler, and Robert Müller. My dissertation although anchored in German literary studies, provides an interdisciplinary approach by incorporating cultural history, aesthetics, dance theory, and spatial theory.

Conferences:

“Performing Both On and Off Stage: Movement and Dance in Berlin,”
            Berlin and Modernism, University of the South, Sewanee, TN, September 2008.

“Dance and Disease:  Metaphors of the Modern Individual's Experience in the City,” 
            Graduate Student Research Day, Vanderbilt University, April 2008.

“Veitstanz: A Stimulant Affecting the Modern Individual,”
            Kentucky Foreign Language Conference, University of Kentucky, Lexington, April 2008.

Awards and Grants:

• Gisela Mosig Research Fellowship 2006-2007
• The Émigré Memorial German Internship Program (EMGIP) - German State Parliaments  (Summer 2006)
• Friends of Dance Summer Scholarship Award (2003)