Teaching German Literature Through Larp: A Proposition

This article proposes that live-action role-playing games, specifically short "nano-games" and freeform formats, can teach German literature in ways comparable to an analytic essay, while generating the emotional engagement that traditional lectures and read-aloud methods often fail to produce. The author argues that full-scale literary larps are too logistically demanding for undergraduate foreign-language classrooms, whereas nano-games can be compact, tightly focused, and adaptable to small groups. The central claim is that game design can serve as a form of literary interpretation, inviting students first to experience a text's themes through play and then to reflect critically on both the game and the source.

The article supports this argument with two student-designed nano-games from a University of Cincinnati German literature course in Spring 2016: Unrequited, an adaptation of Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther, and Babble-On, based on Emine Sevgi Özdamar's Mutterzunge. Unrequited uses a simple sorting mechanic in which players take on the roles of Albert, Lotte, and Werther, producing an aesthetic reproduction of the novel's love-triangle dynamics that the classroom then discusses. Babble-On has players invent family lives in rapidly shrinking vocabulary, dramatizing the loss of language and identity that Özdamar explores. The author describes the emotional and interpretive responses these games elicited and presents them as evidence that students can argue about German literary meaning through play.

The scope of the work is primarily pedagogical and theoretical, grounded in the context of German Studies in the United States and the second-language acquisition literature. Rather than presenting systematic empirical data such as survey results or controlled comparisons, the article relies on the author's teaching experience across two semesters and on examples from student designers. Its methodology is therefore reflective and case-based, and its conclusions about student engagement are offered as proposals for further testing. The author also outlines a planned expansion into a full German literary overview course and a future publication of classroom-ready game materials.