Professor Alfred Douglas White

The Cardiff School of European Languages, Translation and Politics is sad to announce the death of Professor Alfred White, a former Professor of German and Head of German Studies in the School.  

Alfred White studied French and German at Jesus College, Oxford gaining his degree in 1963.  He went on to take his doctorate at Oxford with a thesis on 'The Development of the Thought of E G Kolbenheyer from 1901 to 1934'.

Professor White joined what was then University College Cardiff in 1966 as a lecturer and  was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 1979. He became Head of German after the merger with UWIST in 1988 and was awarded a Personal Chair in 2004. Alfred's teaching and research interests were in German literature 1880 to the present day and modern language learning.  He published on Storm, Brecht, Frisch, expressionism, and literary and cultural nationalism.  His  publications included The One-Eyed Man: Social Reality in the German Novel 1848-1968, Der Gute Mensch Von Sezuan, Brecht: Critical Monographs in English, Max Frisch: the Reluctant Modernist, Bertolt Brecht's Great Plays and Storm: Der Schimmelreiter.

As well as teaching and researching Alfred was active in university administration both inside and outside the School as a member of Senate, Academic Court and in the old Humanities Faculty.  He was also active in the AUT both as a delegate and a member of the ad hoc negotiating team.  

Alfred taught many generations of students at Cardiff and was always an advocate for his discipline and for the department of German at Cardiff.

Professor White retired in 2005.  The School extends its deepest sympathy to his widow Diana, who was also a long-serving member of staff in the School.