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SoSe 21: The European Spa. Entanglements, Itineraries. Maps. A Digital Humanities Approach

Henrike Schmidt

Information for students

The number of participants limited to 12 students from each university. Since the semester terms in Berlin and Amsterdam do not coincide, phases of varying seminar intensity over the course of the semester are possible in consultation with the participants. close

Additional information / Pre-requisites

Lecturers: Henrike Schmidt (FU), Christian Noack and Anna Cabanel (University of Amsterdam)

Comments

The seminar suggests to introduce MA students to the use of databases in the humanities. It is offered in collaboration with the current HERA research project The European Spa as transnational public space and social metaphor. The project investigates how the European spa, with its characteristic institutions such as the Kurpark, sanatorium, grand hotel and casino, developed into a transnational public space and functioned as a stage for the negotiation of political, social and cultural issues of European relevance. The seminar offers an opportunity to participate directly in an interdisciplinary research environment and to engage in cooperation with peers from the University of Amsterdam. Using the data analysis and visualization platform nodegoat, participants will initially familiarize themselves with the basic approaches and methods in Digital Humanities. In small groups, they will undertake case studies of their own using the nodegoat database environment, the results of which feed into the research project and possibly become part of its publications or a project-based virtual exhibition. The objectives of the seminar are among others - to investigate the European spa and spa culture as a prism for understanding how people negotiated vital political, social and cultural questions in past and present; - to use fictional and non-fictional sources to reconstruct elements of 19th century European spa culture and feeding the findings into a database; - to translate findings into database-friendly formats and apply data entry rules, - to use the database to document and visualize transnational entanglements over time and space. close