Iris Bork-Goldfield

Iris Bork-Goldfield is a faculty member at Wesleyan University, where she has worked since 2008. Prior to this, she held teaching positions at Plymouth State University, Dartmouth College, and Fairfield University, where she also served as Associate Director of International Studies and Academic Advisor for Study Abroad. Her professional focus spans German literature, intercultural communication, foreign language pedagogy, and film studies.

• Education:
  • MA in Deutsch als Fremdsprache (German as a Foreign Language), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich
  • PhD in German History and Cultural Representation, Munich

Her research interrogates German literature and culture across the 19th to 21st centuries, with a particular emphasis on Interkulturelle Literatur (intercultural literature) by non-German authors. Recent work explores youth resistance in the GDR (1949–1953) and the Holocaust-era experiences of Jewish families in Hamburg. She integrates documentary filmmaking into her scholarship, exemplified by We Wanted to Do Something! (2014–2016 screenings).

Her publications and presentations highlight cross-disciplinary approaches to historiography, resistance narratives, and cultural memory. She has collaborated with students on multimedia projects and presented globally at institutions like MIT, the Goethe Institute, and the Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship.