Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Richard Sheirich Papers
PC.0020
View entire collection guide
Search this collection
Table of contents
Title: Richard Sheirich Papers
Dates: 1955-2009
Collection number: PC.0020
Creator:
Sheirich, Richard, 1927-2011
Extent:
10 Linear Feet
(9 record cartons, 2 document boxes, 1 half-size document
box)
Repository:
Claremont Colleges. Library. Special Collections, The Claremont
Colleges Library, Claremont, CA 91711.
Abstract: This collection contains course
materials, departmental correspondence and planning documents, and grant proposals belonging
to Pomona College professor, Richard M. Sheirich.
Physical Location: Please consult repository.
Language of Material: Languages represented in
collection: English, German.
Administrative Information
Collection open for research.
All requests for permission to reproduce or to publish must be submitted in writing to
the Archives
[Identification of item], Richard Sheirich Papers (PC-0020). Pomona College Archives,
Special Collections, The Claremont Colleges Library, Claremont, California.
Provenance/Source of Acquisition
Gift of Perdita Sheirich, 2012, 2014.
Additions to the collection are not anticipated.
Processed and arranged by Jamie Weber.
Biography / Administrative History
Richard M. Sheirich was born in 1927 in Erie, Pennsylvania and attended local schools
through high school. As his parents felt 16 was too young to go to college, he spent an
extra year at Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts, graduating in 1945. He attended Colgate
University in Hamilton, New York, for part of his freshman year before enlisting in the
U.S. Navy. After a year's service at Williamsburg, Virginia, Sheirich was discharged and
returned to Colgate to complete his undergraduate degree in 1949.
He earned a master's degree in German from Northwestern University, and a Ph.D. in German
from Harvard University in 1965. He also held a DAAD Fellowship at Universität Hamburg in
1957-58. After teaching at Colgate and UC Berkeley, he joined the Pomona faculty in 1965,
and for 31 years taught courses in German language, literature and culture ranging from
early tribal migrations to the Cold War and reunification. He also conducted research on
Viennese poet, novelist, and playwright Richard Beer-Hofmann, producing a number of
articles as well as an edition of Beer-Hofmann's correspondence, Der Briefwechsel mit
Paula, 1896-1937. Most summers, Professor Sheirich spent time in Vienna, doing research.
In the 1990s, Sheirich led a major grant-funded project, "German Across the Curriculum,"
to better integrate the study of German into non-language courses in the humanities and
social sciences. The goal of the project, funded by the National Endowment for the
Humanities, was to improve foreign-language skills and to promote, among both faculty and
students, a greater understanding of the complexities inherent in a foreign culture and of
the relationship between language and other disciplines in the humanities and social
sciences.
Scope and Content of the Collection
This collection contains materials belonging to Pomona College professor, Richard M.
Sherich, for courses in German language, literature, and culture. Additional materials
include those related to the "German Across the Curriculum" program and departmental
correspondence and planning documents from Sheirich's involvement in the Modern Languages
Department, study abroad program, Radio Oldenborg, and various other committees and
programs. Grant proposals, annual reports, sabbatical reports, and correspondence with
colleagues and students are also included.
The collection is organized into the following two series:
- Series 1: Course Materials, 1969-1993 and undated
- Series 2: Administrative Materials, 1955-2009 and undated
Audio cassettes of recordings:
Hitler's speech to the Reichstag, 1 September 1939; Faust: Der Tragodie, Erster Teil
(Faust: The Tragedy, First Part); Walther von der Vogelweide, poems 1-14; Deutschland im
Zweiten Weltkrieg 1941 Attack on Russia (Germany in the Second World War, Attack on Russia
in 1941); Fruhe Zeugnisse Deutscher Dichtung Zauberspruche, Hildebrandslied in Alt Hoch
Deutsch (German seal spells "Hildebrand's Song" in Old High German); Mark Hussey's "Third
Reich"
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the
library’s online public access catalog.
Pomona College (Claremont, Calif.)
Pomona College (Claremont, Calif.) -- Faculty
Education Curricula
German language
German language--Study and teaching--Foreign speakers
History
Teaching
Sheirich, Richard, 1927-2011
Universities and colleges--Departments
Correspondence
Lectures
Outlines and syllabi
Reports