SLLC offers students the opportunity to explore the language, literature, and culture of German-speaking countries. Many great writers, thinkers and artists of the modern era came from these regions - Sigmund Freud, Hannah Arendt, Friedrich Nietzsche, Herta Müller, Karl Marx, Franz Kafka, and Ingeborg Bachmann, to name just a few - while almost every discipline in the humanities, sciences, and social sciences has a strong German tradition. In addition, Germany plays a crucial role in the European Union, on the world political stage, and in economic dealings with the United States and around the world. Among Europeans, the approximately 101 million native speakers of German outnumber those of English, French, Italian, or Spanish. German Studies offers you the possibility of participating in this vibrant cultural tradition first hand.  The importance of German culture in such diverse areas explains why MU German majors have successfully pursued careers in business, engineering, finance, law, journalism, government service, teaching, medicine, and the sciences, as well as in art, literature, philosophy, music, and film. Non-majors have also discovered that their knowledge of German language and culture complements such fields as architecture, economics, government, history, engineering, and computer science. Whatever your future career, you will find that German Studies, as part of a liberal education, will enrich your professional and personal lives.