Peter Johansson, Professor of German

Peter Johansson received his BA and MA degrees from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Peter was a student at the University of Freiburg, Germany from 1968-1970 through the U Mass Atlantic Studies Program. He received his PhD in 1977 in Germanic Languages and Literatures from the University of California-Santa Barbara. In 1992 Peter was a Fulbright scholar to Germany. From 1992-1994 he also was the author of a  $110,000 U.S. Department of Education grant which provided  UWRF faculty in Business and Agriculture with a better understanding of the European business climate since German unification and the fall of the Iron Curtain.

Peter's professional interests are in German language and literature.  His particular areas of interest are dialects (Low German) and drama.  He has an abiding interest in linguistic affinities between German and Yiddish, and between German and English. English, in part, developed out of the Saxon language of northern Germany (today's Low German). Schiller, Brecht, Duerrenmatt and Frisch are his favorite dramatists. Peter also follows political, social, and economic developments in the newly constituted European Union.  Peter keeps up to date with European and pedagogical issues by contacting colleagues on the internet and attending regional and national foreign language conferences.  He serves as a consultant to D. C. Heath publishing.  Dr. Johansson traveled to Germany four times in the past eight years for professional development. Peter  serves as German Club advisor and the German Scholarship fund-raising coordinator. 

Peter Johansson travels three times a year to the UW-Madison campus to create, review and discuss German Placement Test items for the UW-System.  Meetings for 2008-2009 are Sept 20, 2008,  Feb 20, 2009 and April 24, 2009.  The tests are used in the UW-System and are sold nationally. Spring 2009 Peter Johansson is completing his second three-year term as Senator.  He has served a total of 14 years on the  River Falls  Faculty Senate.