I am a Professor of German.
Research Interests
Secret police files as life writing; Yiddish theater in and from Romania.
Biography
Dr. Corina L. Petrescu is Professor of German in the Department of Modern Languages, where she has been teaching since 2008. She obtained her Ph. D. in German Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2006). She is an accredited researcher with the National Council for the Study of the Securitate Archives (CNSAS) in Romania. Over the years, her research has been supported by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, and the Fulbright Commission.
Books
Glajar, Valentina, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu, eds. Cold War Spy Stories from Eastern Europe. Lincoln, NE: Nebraska UP, 2019.
Glajar, Valentina. Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu, eds. Secret Police Files from the Eastern Bloc: Between Surveillance and Life Writing. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2016.
Petrescu, Corina L. Against All Odds: Subversive Spaces in National Socialist Germany. Oxford et.al.: Peter Lang, 2010.
Articles and Book Chapters
Petrescu, Corina L. “Of a Mother and a Daughter on Stage: Dina Koenig, Lya Koenig-Stolper, and Yiddish Theater in Romania.” Women on the Yiddish Stage. Eds. Alyssa Quint and Amanda Seigel. Oxford, UK: Legenda, 2023. 293-312.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Ana Novac.” Donau-Karpaten-Literatur: Lexikon zur deutschsprachigen Literatur aus Zentral- und Südosteuropa (2019). URL: https://dokalit.ikgs.de/novac-ana.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Di dray groshn opere: Bertolt Brecht on the Yiddish Stage” in Brecht Yearbook 44 (2019): 202-220.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Of Sources and Files: The Making of the Securitate Target Ana Novac,” Cold War Spy Stories from the Eastern Bloc. Eds. Valentina Glajar, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu. Lincoln, NE: Nebraska UP, 2019. 137-160.
Glajar, Valentina, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu. “Introduction,” Cold War Spy Stories from the Eastern Bloc. Eds. Valentina Glajar, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu. Lincoln, NE: Nebraska UP, 2019. 1-26.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Beim Lesen einer Akte: Securitate Unterlagen als Geschichte und Geschichten,“ Aus den Giftschränken des Kommunismus. Eds. Florian Kührer-Wielach and Michaela Nowotnick. Regensburg: Verlag Friedrich Pustet, 2018. 191-204.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Auf den Spuren des jiddischen Theaters in Rumänien – Archivbericht,“ Spiegelungen – Zeitschrift für deutsche Kultur und Geschichte Südosteuropas (Special Issue: Archive in Rumänien I) 1 (2018): 95-101.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Rote Handschuhe (2001): Eginald Schlattners Mea-culpa-Roman?,” Monatshefte (Special Issue: Archive und Geheimdienstakten: Dialogisches Erinnern an Verfolgung und Zensur im Ostblock), 110.2 (2018): 230-240.
Petrescu, Corina L., Alison Lewis, and Valentina Glajar, “Einleitung,” Monatshefte (Special Issue: Archive und Geheimdienstakten: Dialogisches Erinnern an Verfolgung und Zensur im Ostblock), 110.2 (2018): 169-177.
Petrescu, Corina L. “Under Surveillance: The Jewish State Theater in Bucharest in the Files of the Securitate in the 1970s,” Caietele CNSAS (CNSAS Notebooks) 2 (2017): 119-136.
Petrescu, Corina L., “Celebrating Yiddish Theater in Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej’s Romania,” Revista de istorie a evreilor din România (Review for the History of Jews in Romania) 2 (2017): 182-197. [Slightly modified version in Hungarian: “Egy másik 1956: A romániai jiddis színház 80 éve” (A Different 1956 – 80 Years of Yiddish Theater in Romania), Regio4 (2017): 227-252. Translated into Hungarian by Marcell Nagy and Szonja Komoróczy].
Petrescu, Corina L. “Witness for the Prosecution: Eginald Schlattner in the Files of the Securitate,” Secret Police Files from the Eastern Bloc: Between Surveillance and Life Writing. Eds. Valentina Glajar, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2016. 84-111.
Lewis, Alison, Valentina Glajar, and Corina L. Petrescu, “Introduction,” Secret Police Files from the Eastern Bloc: Between Surveillance and Life Writing. Eds. Valentina Glajar, Alison Lewis, and Corina L. Petrescu. Rochester, NY: Camden House, 2016. 1-23.
Courses Taught
- Germ 303 Composition and Conversation I
- Germ 304 Composition and Conversation II
- Germ 321 German Culture and Civilization
- Germ 331 Introduction to Literary Analysis
- Germ 361 German Cinema
- Germ 561 Advanced Topics in German Cinema
- Germ 578 Survey of German Literature and Culture II
- Germ 585 19th Century German Literature
- Germ 586 20th Century Literature and Culture
- Germ 593 Topics in Cultural Studies
Education
B.A. German, University of Bucharest, Romania (1999)
M.A. German, University of Pittsburgh Main Campus (2000)
Ph.D. German, University of Wisconsin-Madison (2006)
Recognitions
- Fulbright Global Scholar, Wilhelm Filderman – Centre for the Study of Jewish History, Bucharest, Romania, and Goldreich Family Institute for Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture at Tel Aviv University, Israell, 2023
- Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship, Institut für Jüdische Studien und Religionswissenschaft, Universität Potsdam, Germany, 2016
- Senior Core Fellowship, Institute for Advanced Study, Central European University Budapest, Hungary, 2015
- DAAD Research Visit Grant, Universität Potsdam, Germany, 2014
- DAAD Summer Research Grant, Washington University in St. Louis, MO, 2013
- Summer Research Grant, College of Liberal Arts, The University of Mississippi, 2009, 2010, 2011