Arcadia Public Library

Director Uwe Belz focuses his attention on viewing Karl Marx from an alternative perspective, showing the emotional and romantic sides of the historical figure. Passages from LOVE LETTERS that Marx and his fiancée, Jenny von Westphalen, exchanged as teenagers blend with paintings and beautifully atmospheric photographs of places connected to Marx. The letters and poems are read by well-known East German actors, such as Jenny Gröllmann and Dieter...

Diana Groó’s documentary tells the story of Regina Jonas (1902-1944) a strong woman, who made history by becoming the first properly ordained woman rabbi in the world.The daughter of an Orthodox Jewish peddler, Jonas grew up in Berlin’s slum, studied at the liberal Hochschulefür die Wissenschaft des Judentums (College for the Scientific Study of Judaism) beginning in 1924,and was ordained in 1935. At age 37, she met the love of her life, Rabbi...

While Germany sits as one of the major democratic models, an ex-prisoner of the Stasi delivers from his former cell a frightening testimony that questions the sustainability of our contemporary democracies. 

In HEIMAT IS A SPACE IN TIME, German filmmaker Thomas Heise shares the stories of three generations of his family, tracing the contours of the major historical uphevals that afflicted Germany in the 20th century. Uncovering journal entries, photographs and contemporary footage, Heise creates a poetic meditation on individual and collective history.

This film documents a vital moment in the re-building of a city center, where the Berlin wall once stood. Within a few years Pariser Platz was rebuilt, accompanied by an extensive public debate about the quality of the new architecture and the merits of the city planning for the area. An imposing assembly of internationally acclaimed architects found new solutions for the ten buildings that once defined the site, among them the American embassy. Featured...

This series teaches all the skills needed to understand and speak basic German. Focusing on major attractions in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, these episodes are perfect preparation for anyone who wants to experience German-speaking culture firsthand, from conversing with locals to reading signs and menus to navigating the railways and Autobahn.

Travel to two cities in Austria, Vienna (called Wien) and Salzburg, to practice your fundamental skills in German. Learn useful expressions for giving directions. Then investigate the beautifully simple word gern, which expresses approval or enjoyment. Find out how to negate a statement with a well-placed nicht. And along the way, you'll drool over Vienna's multitude of delicious coffee libations!

Wie viel Uhr ist es? (What time is it?) Learn to tell time and how to read a railway timetable. Rehearse using the prepositions um, von, and bis in a temporal context. Also discover that German has three distinct words that cover our English term, "time." Then dive into possessive pronouns—in singular and plural, as well as nominative and accusative—picking up new vocabulary along the way.

Use the public service messages on German Bierdeckeln (beer coasters) to launch into modal verbs: a two-part verb construction that expresses desire, necessity, or possibility, as in Ich möchte Deutsch lernen (I would like to learn German). Review the months, seasons, and days of the week. Also, see how the accusative case is used with certain expressions of time and after specific prepositions.

Begin with the greeting, Wie geht's? (more formally, Wie geht es Ihnen?) Rehearse responses, such as, Es geht mir gut and Es geht mir Ausgezeichnet. Practice conjugating present-tense regular verbs, and discover the wonderful utility of the indefinite pronoun man. Finally, learn the German names and nationalities for European countries. Along the way, encounter a new sound: the a-umlaut, ä.