PARI work meeting Decembre 2022

On Thursday, December 1, 2022, the event began with the arrival of the fellows, postdocs and doctoral students at the Haus auf der Grenze in Geisa. The participants were given a guided tour of the Point Alpha site and the memorial before continuing on to Geisa Castle. A workshop was held there, which was moderated by Tobias Becker and Vivian Seidel. The workshop included a welcome and introduction of the Point Alpha Research Institute (PARI) as well as a joint exchange among the participants.

Projectpresentations by PARI-fellows

After the arrival of other workshop participants and check-in at Geisa Castle, we had dinner together. Claudia Wiesner and Philipp Gassert then opened the evening with a welcome and introduction. The PARI Fellows then presented their projects. Zhylien Kaja from Fulda University of Applied Sciences presented the relationship between the Western Balkan countries and the EU. Stefanie Eisenhuth from Potsdam spoke about “Beauty for all!” – Beauty Work and Distinction in State and Post-Socialism from 1945 to 1995. Birgit Hofmann from Heidelberg analyzed the figures of thought of the East-West conflict in the foreign policy debates of the Federal Republic of Germany since 1989/1990, and Andrew Tompkins from Erfurt presented “Bordering Germany(s): Everyday Life in Cold War Border Environments”.

What is interdisciplinarity?

On Friday, December 2, 2022, the event kicked off with a session on the PARI research priorities. Christiane Kuller gave an opening lecture on the topic “What is interdisciplinarity?” The participants then worked in small groups on various key topics: “Cold War and its significance for the present”, moderated by Philipp Gassert, “Borders/Borders”, led by Christiane Kuller, and “Democracy in the global order”, supervised by Claudia Wiesner.

The results of the group work were presented and discussed in the plenary session. Questions about the further research agenda and the links to the projects of the fellows, doctoral students and professors were discussed.

Practical workshop

In the afternoon, a “practical workshop” was held to discuss how the content ideas and thematic priorities can be implemented within PARI. Topics such as joint formats, applications, third-party funding planning and collaborative projects were discussed. The participants developed project plans, schedules and format plans for 2023. This session continued after a short coffee break.

The event offered participants extensive opportunities to exchange ideas and develop new research approaches and projects that will have a lasting impact on the work of the Point Alpha Research Institute.