Carol Jenkins came to the German language through her other two abiding loves, German Shepherds and Hanoverian horses. Building on this foundation, the excellent German program at Carleton College opened her eyes to the opportunities for cultural exploration afforded by the study of language, literature, and history, a discovery aided by a junior year abroad in Freiburg, Germany. At Washington University in St. Louis, her love of literature as a means to better understand cultural shifts and trends was further nurtured (in part through another year abroad, this time in Tübingen), culminating in a dissertation investigating the intersection of literature and politics in the work of Adalbert Stifter.

Carol discovered in graduate school that her heart lies in teaching, which she has done previously in Graz, Austria as well as at Washington and St. Louis Universities, in both English and German. She has been at UMSL since 2007. Whatever the course, be it focused on language acquisition, rhetoric, or cultural exploration, the goal remains the same: to awaken in her students the spirit of wonder inherent in discovering new worlds through language, texts, and other cultural documents. In this spirit she has developed courses on topics as diverse as crime stories, sports, and leisure, German humor, children’s literature, and the culture of the Weimar Republic. In addition, she loves teaching all levels of German, watching students develop both language skills and new cultural competencies, both of which will inform their lives for as long as they allow them to.

At home on a horse farm with her husband, four dogs, eight cats, and six horses, Carol can often be found in the barn or pounding the pavement with the dogs, remembering when she had more time to ride the horses and not just clean up after them.