German-speaking Europe Research Articles

Retracing theSattelzeit: Thoughts on the Historiography of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Eras

The era of the French Revolution and the Napoleon Wars left a deep mark not only on political, social, and cultural life in German-speaking Europe, but also on German academic historiography as it emerged over the course of the nineteenth century. Both before and after the formation of theKaiserreich, professional historians like Leopold von Ranke, Johann Gustav Droysen, Heinrich von Sybel, and Heinrich von Treitschke sought in their scholarship to justify Prussia's leadership role in Germany, and the French revolutionary and Napoleonic years figured centrally in this effort. For Friedrich Meinecke, writing in the Wilhelmine years, a remembrance of this era was crucial if Germany was to retain its intellectual and moral bearings: “One thing is clear: the survival and continuity of German intellectual life is somehow related to the events between 1807 and 1815—the liberation of Germany from foreign rule, and the transformation of Prussia, her most powerful state, into a freer, more national political entity.” InDas Zeitalter der deutschen Erhebung(1906), Meinecke related the process by which the formerly apolitical, individualistic musings of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Wilhelm von Humboldt, and Johann Gottlieb Fichte were given practical, political implementation in the reforms of Karl vom Stein, Karl von Hardenberg, and Gerhard von Scharnhorst, and then in the Wars of Liberation: “By descending to the state, the spirit not only preserved its own endangered existence as well as that of the state, it secured a reservoir of moral and psychological wealth, a wellspring of creative power for later generations.”

Intellectual, Institutional, and Technological Transitions: Central European History, 2004–2014

Volumes 38 to 47 of Central European History, which appeared from July 2004 to June 2014, represented years of fundamental transition in the life of the journal and of its sponsoring society: then the Conference Group for Central European History, now the Central European History Society. This fundamental transition manifested itself in three forms: institutional formality, both of the journal and of the Conference Group/Society; publishing organization and technology—from the ways in which the editor produced the journal to the ways in which the audience consumed the scholarship it published; and, last but not least, the intellectual focus and content of the history of German-speaking Central Europe that Central European History presented to scholars and students alike. Although the decade presented some unexpected and surprising challenges, all these transitions were already visible in July 2002 when I presented my proposal to become editor of Central European History to the Editor Search Committee, which consisted of Konrad Jarausch, Kees Gispen, and then-editor Kenneth Barkin.

Authoritarianism in Modern Germany History

Why study the history of modern German-speaking Central Europe? If pressed to answer this question fifty years ago, a Germanist would likely have said something to the effect that one studies modern German history to trace the “German” origins of Nazism, with the broader aim of understanding authoritarianism. While the problem of authoritarianism clearly remains relevant to this day, the nation-state-centered approach to understanding it has waned, especially in light of the recent shift toward transnational and global history. The following essay focuses on the issue of authoritarianism, asking whether the study of German history is still relevant to authoritarianism. It begins with a review of two conventional approaches to understanding authoritarianism in modern German history, and then thinks about it in a different way through G. W. F. Hegel in an effort to demonstrate the vibrancy of German intellectual history for exploring significant and global issues such as authoritarianism.

Beyond the Rechtsgemeinschaft, with Trust - Reframing the Concept of European Rule of Law

This article shows that the European Union finds itself in a crisis, to be precise, a crisis of meaning, because the concept European community of law has become inappropriate. This is true especially in German-speaking Europe where, more than in other places, Rechtsgemeinschaft is key to understanding the entire European edifice. A concept that was initially a stroke of genius has become obsolete in light of the transformations of Europe. Today, it should be reduced to an argument for broad powers of the courts, but nothing more. The article then seeks the basis for a robust understanding of the concept of European rule of law. It is informed by contemporary public opinion which addresses the crisis of the rule of law as a crisis of trust. The potential dangers inherent in such an approach are developed in the light of trust research. This enables a substantiation of what constitutes European rule of law as laid down in Art. 2 TEU and allows important crisis phenomena to be better identified. The article concludes with a comparison between the trustworthiness of the current European community and that of currently proposed alternatives.

Are the school version of the assessment of motor and process skills measures valid for German-speaking children?

Background: There are no validated assessment tools for evaluating quality of schoolwork task performance of children living in German-speaking Europe (GSE).Objective: To determine whether the international age-normative means of the School Version of the Assessment of Motor and Process Skills (School AMPS) are valid for use in GSE.Methods: The participants were 159 typically-developing children, 3-12 years, from GSE. We examined the proportions of School AMPS measures falling within ±2 standard deviation (SD) of the international age-normative means, and evaluated for significant group differences (p < 0.05) in mean School AMPS measures between the GSE sample and the international age-normative sample using one-sample Z tests. When significant mean differences were found, we evaluated if the differences were clinically meaningful.Results: At least 95% of the GSE School AMPS measures fell within ±2 SD of the international age-normative means for the School AMPS. The only significant mean differences were for 6- (p < 0.01) and 8-year-olds (p = 0.02), and only the 6-year-old school process mean difference was clinically meaningful.Conclusions: Because the only identified clinically meaningful difference was associated with likely scoring error of one rater, the international age-normative means of the School AMPS appear to be valid for use with children in GSE.

Gender Diversity Issues Within the Company and Beyond: Perceptions of Investor Relations Professionals in German-Speaking Europe

Against the background of the statutory gender quotas for supervisory boards that were recently introduced in several European countries including Germany, we examine how investors and capital market participants perceive the relevance of gender diversity for corporate valuation in stock markets. To address these perceptions, we conduct an anonymous survey of investor relations managers in Austria, Germany and Switzerland who are the natural contact persons for investors and act as the predominant information source in each valuation-relevant topic for capital market participants. Our findings suggest that staff diversity remains a niche topic for capital markets. Accordingly, corporate initiatives for increased gender diversity in executive positions are believed by capital market participants to have no impact on external company valuation. The vast majority of companies considers diversity issues predominantly in the context of fairness and equality. The most influential external stakeholders driving diversity initiatives are government authorities and regulators, women’s and interest associations and the media. Half of the companies surveyed have not implemented specific promotion programs for women in leadership, and almost two thirds of all surveyed companies have not set any planning targets in this context.

The stone surgeon in the mirror: how are German-speaking urologists treating large renal stones today?

To elucidate the current treatment strategies of LRS in German-speaking Europe. Little is known about the treatment of large renal stones (LRS>3cm) in daily urological practice. LRS therapy can be, however, challenging and hazardous. A 39 item web-based survey was performed among urologists listed by the German, Austrian and Swiss Associations of Urology, addressing professionals treating LRS "on their own" and working in a German-speaking country. Uniparametric descriptions indicated as absolute numbers and percentages without p values, simple linear associations and bubble plots without arithmetic means or bar charts with standard deviation between targeted parameters and percentages were used. 266 of the 6586 responding urologists claimed to treat urinary stones on a regular basis. The majority of them were male (90.2%) and over 50 years old (42.9%). Most stones are treated in non-university hospitals (69.5%). 81.9% of all the institutions treat more than 150 cases/y. Open surgery is still performed in 45.5% of the centres, laparoscopy in 32%. Percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PNL) is the primary treatment option. Antimicrobial strategies vary considerably. Serious complications seem to be rare. However, quite a few responders reported treatment-related deaths. The main limitation is the absolute number of urologists performing LRS treatment, which is unknown. The German-speaking urologist treating LRS is a male and over 50. Although he performs PNL primarily, he is not averse to open surgery and SWL. He applies guidelines and employs modern equipment. Only antimicrobial strategies are out of line with the international standards.

AnsgarKlein &amp; OlafZimmermann (eds). Impulse der Reformation: Der zivilgesellschaftliche Diskurs (Dynamic of the Reformation: The Civil Society Discourse). Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 2017, xv + 332 pp.

Unlike many of the books published to coincide with the 500th anniversary of the Reformation initiated by Martin Luther, the focus of this book is neither the events of the 16th century nor the significance of the Reformation for theology and church history. Instead, this volume is intended to reflect the importance of the Reformation for civil society today. Thirty relatively short contributions are organized around seven main areas: the Reformation jubilee; state and society; Protestantism, values, and political culture; churches and civil society; economy and ecology; the social question; and European and international civil society. The authors include university academics, activists, and those in leadership positions in church-related institutions and agencies, coming from German-speaking Europe. In a review such as this, it is impossible to do justice to all the contributions, touching on issues as diverse as gender equality, the role of local churches in civil society, social policy, civil disobedience, development issues, just war and military intervention, and the role of lay people within the church. While some contributions make explicit reference to the 16th-century Reformation and its impact, for others the focus is the contemporary role of the church in society. For those interested in a discussion about the relationship between the Reformation and the modern state and society, the first two sections on the “Reformation jubilee” (3–39) and on “state and society” (31–58) are of particular importance. The essays by Peter Maser of the University of Münster (“History of the Reformation Jubilees” (3–10)) and Thies Gundlach, vice-president of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) (“Culture of remembrance and structuring commemorations” (11–19)) are particularly pertinent contributions to a consideration of the memorialization of the Reformation anniversary since the 16th century. Maser provides a historical overview of previous anniversaries, while Gundlach identifies the tension between presenting past events and highlighting the relevance of the Reformation for contemporary society. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the focus of the essays is the situation in Germany, and more particularly the relationship between church and society as it developed in West Germany following the Second World War. Only one contribution, that of Markus Meckel, a pastor and activist in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) who served as GDR foreign minister after the free elections of 1990, explicitly deals with the heritage of civil society and the Protestant churches in East Germany. Overall there seems little consideration of contemporary changes in the German religious landscape, seen maybe most dramatically in eastern Germany, the heartland of the Reformation, which is also one of the least religious territories in Europe. While 40 years of communist rule undoubtedly played a particular role in shaping the decline of religious adherence in eastern Germany, there are also major shifts taking place in the former West Germany, especially in the cities. Moreover, apart from the essay by Jeannette Behringer (“European Civil Society and the Role of Protestant Churches”), there is little consideration of the relationship between Protestantism and civil society as it has developed in other European countries, and just one essay, “The Reformers Were Never in Africa,” by Volker Faigle, deals with the situation outside Europe. This may be explained by the overall shape of this volume, and the choice of authors, but given the oft-made claim that the Reformation was a global event, it might have been worth giving greater consideration to the relationship between the Reformation and civil society outside Germany. Notwithstanding such reservations, this volume provides an easily accessible range of contributions on the relationship between church and society, 500 years after the Reformation. Dr Stephen G. Brown is editor of The Ecumenical Review.

Catholic missionary associations and the saving of African child slaves in nineteenth-century Germany

ABSTRACTIn the second half of the nineteenth century, German-speaking Europe saw the foundation of some Catholic associations, which campaigned against slavery and the slave trade in parts of North and East Africa and promoted the “saving” of slaves and particularly child slaves by, for instance, ransoming boys and girls, baptizing them, and placing them at Catholic institutions and missionary stations. Examining confession-based antislavery activism in its discursive and practical dimensions, the essay argues that the successful foundation and expansion of these associations was due to both transnational structures and church networks of charity, on the one hand, and the activation and exchange of a particular set of ideas on slavery, abolitionism, Christian superiority, gender, childhood, vulnerability, and innocence, on the other. The essay suggests reexamining the relationship between German Catholicism and slavery by pointing to the various ways in which the movement of people and the circulation of information, ideas, and visions about slaves and/or slavery in parts of Africa motivated charitable acts of praying and giving, thus entering the everyday life-worlds of many Catholics in Germany.

The Social Before Sociocognitive Theory: Explaining Hypnotic Suggestion in German-Speaking Europe, 1900–1960

The article intends to retrace and review German discourse on hypnotic suggestion from 1900 onward, demonstrating the variety of arguments advanced to account for the social relationship in the hypnotic setting well before the emergence of sociocognitive theory. Using Spanos’s distinction between “happenings” and “doings,” it shows how, in the case of the “social” in early 20th century German texts on (hypnotic) suggestion, the passive observer, recipient, or victim of hypnosis, a trope familiar to the discipline for many decades, was called into question. This image, however, was not called into question by scientists experimenting in laboratories. On the contrary, the neurologists, psychologists, and philosophers who proffered a new way of seeing suggestion, one that privileged the hypnotic as well as the reciprocity between hypnotist and hypnotic, were part of a wider movement within the social sciences (grounded in hermeneutics, phenomenology, and Gestalt theory) that distanced itself from “positivistic” methodologies and “scientistic” verities. The article, then, seeks to remind readers that the sociocognitive perspective does not define the sociopsychological study of hypnosis.

Validation of a German short version of the Attitudes towards Patient Safety Questionnaire (G-APSQshort) for the measurement of undergraduate medical students' attitudes to and needs for patient safety.

Introduction: Topics of patient safety are being taught increasingly within medical eudcation. To date, however, there is no suitable means of measuring the status quo of medical students’ attitudes towards patient safety in German-speaking Europe. The German validation of a short version of the Attitude towards Patient Safety Questionnaire (G-APSQshort) is meant to fill this gap with the aid of two validation studies. Methods: In Study 1, item and reliability analyses were used to examine internal consistency as well as factorial structure. In Study 2, the measurement sensitivity of the G-APSQshort in detecting changes in attitudes was assessed. Results: Study 1 comprised N=83 participants (M=23.16 years; 21 female). Adequate internal consistency (Cronbach’s α=.722-.903) was reached in 6 of the seven subscales. The factor analysis showed that the six extracted factors matched the theoretically conceived subscales.Study 2 comprised N=21 participants (M=26 years; 11 female). A multivariate analysis of variance showed that the differences before and after a short-term intervention were significant with medium effect size (F(1;16)=6.675; p<.05; η2=.29).Discussion: In six subscales, the G-APSQshort can be considered valid in respect to measuring point and change. It is hoped that regular and concerted implementation of measuring instruments such as the G-APSQshort will help to develop a common ground for data comparison among many different German-speaking medical faculties.

The emerging ‘science of social work’ in the United States and German-speaking countries: A comparison

The aim of this article is to begin a comparison between an emerging ‘science of social work’ in the United States and German-speaking countries (Switzerland, Germany, and Austria), with the intention of moving the discussion forward. It is found that the ‘science of social work’ is more developed in German-speaking Europe than in the United States, but that similar conclusions have been developed in both contexts. However, scholars of the two continents only rarely refer to one another’s work, and the lack of communication between the two groups is hurting the discipline as a whole.

The Horror of Coming Home: Integration and Fragmentation in Caroline de la Motte Fouqué's "Der Abtrünnige"

Caroline de la Motte Fouque's short story Der Abtrunnige (The Turn Coat, 1816) opens on the evening of August 7th 1814, moments before King Friedrich Wilhelm III's regiment returns from the battlefield to Berlin, heralded with a burst of patriotic imagery and pomp. The Prussian eagle on the flag seems to circle above the newly liberated capital city; braziers illuminate the Opernplatz; and the streets of Berlin fill with a sea of lights shining amid laurels and flowers. A crowd waits in tense, silent anticipation until the king appears, in all of his regal glory; Er wird die Sonne der Nacht (112; he becomes the sun of the night).1 Transformed into the very source of light, the king embodies Prussian in this scene. The crowd erupts into a loud Hurra! (112) and follows the king, cheering through the streets to greet the regiment at the Brandenburger Tor.Such patriotic scenes were common during the summer of 1814 as victorious soldiers returned from the Befreiungskriege to Prussia. For example, Fouque's description of the events of August 7th bears striking similarities to the historical account of the homecoming celebration published in Koniglich privilegirte Berlinische Zeitung.2 Prussia's role in the Befreiungskriege (1813-14) was in part the result of large-scale social and military reforms enacted after Prussia's defeat by the French in 1806. Following the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire and the French occupation, Prussia began a series of reforms aimed at strengthening its military and uniting its citizenry against the French, with the goal of one day reclaiming its sovereignty. This provoked a rise in nationalism and anti- French sentiment among the educated middle and upper classes throughout German-speaking Europe in general and Prussia in particular. Although the fragmented state of German-speaking Europe prevented the articulation of a unified German identity, Germany existed as a Kulturnation, bound by a shared culture, language and literature.3 This understanding of Germany was key to promoting the war effort that would eventually defeat Napoleon. Military homecoming ceremonies, such as the one depicted in Der Abtrunnige, referenced this shared Germanness and therefore played an important role in constructing national identity before Germany became an actual nation.In her work Revisiting Prussia's Wars against Napoleon (2015), Karen Hagemann identifies multiple functions that such patriotic homecoming celebrations served: they fostered patriotism and a feeling of national belonging among the population (209), constructed memory through a collective emotional experience (226) and sought to symbolically reintegrate soldiers into civilian life (224). The opening ceremony in Der Abtrunnige embodies these goals. The crowd is described as an anschwellende[r] Menschenstrom (112; rising stream of people) emphasizing its size. When the king emerges, the text reports that alle Herzen zittern (112; all hearts tremble) at the sight of him, implying a Prussian citizenry unified in its love of king and country. The protagonist who watches these events, an unnamed officer, is immediately struck by the presence of many attractive young women. The patriotic symbols, crowds of people honoring the king, and the officer's thoughts of women and-by extension-domestic life correspond to the three symbolic functions of homecoming ceremonies outlined by Hagemann.Although Der Abtrunnige begins with a fairly typical scene of a jubilant public homecoming, the celebratory narrative of return and reintegration is quickly undermined by the introduction of elements that destabilize the protagonist's sense of belonging and security after the war. I argue that the text employs the mode to explore the difficult reality of postwar reintegration.4 By Gothic I am referring both to a set of motifs that have become stock figures in texts, including ghosts, corpses, and haunted buildings, and to the more abstract tendency of literature to dissolve those binaries with which one orders reality, thus blurring the boundaries between life and death, self and other, conscious and unconscious. …

Bluestocking Feminism and British-German Cultural Transfer, 1750–1837 by Alessa Johns

Reviewed by: Bluestocking Feminism and British-German Cultural Transfer, 1750–1837 by Alessa Johns Andrea Speltz Alessa Johns, Bluestocking Feminism and British-German Cultural Transfer, 1750–1837 (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2014). Pp. xiv + 242. $30.00. This volume comprises a series of four studies exploring the impact of transnationalism on proto-feminist thought from the mid-eighteenth century to the early Victorian period. Its methodological framework draws on Bruno Latour's actor-network theory, which author Alessa Johns extends with her own geographic metaphor, terrains vastes. For Johns, Latour's actor-network theory offers "a more heterogeneous and inclusive model of connections and activity" (14). It opens up terrains vastes by decentering historiography away from the canonical authors of national traditions and encouraging an exploration of actors on the peripheries of historical change, particularly women and transnational intellectuals. Chapter 1 focuses on the efforts of two learned women, so-called bluestockings, to promote cultural transfer between Britain and German-speaking lands through the eighteenth-century book trade. The first, Anna Vandenhoeck, was an Englishwoman who owned and operated a publishing house serving the University of Göttingen, a major center of German Enlightenment thought. Vandenhoeck "supported the translation of significant British publications, encouraged British journals through a reading circle, and offered great numbers of British volumes, in the original and in translation, for sale at her shop" (37). The second woman, Duchess Philippine Charlotte of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, amassed a 4,000-volume library that was "wide-ranging, cosmopolitan, and women-oriented" (31). For Johns, the activities and intellectual preoccupations of these women demonstrate a "quotidian rather than transcendent cosmopolitanism," in which "gender position can trump rigid national and social identities" (38). The case studies are intriguing, and Johns's attempt to highlight the depth of women's gender identification in the eighteenth century provides an important impulse for further research on proto-feminist solidarity and political engagement. Chapter 2 examines the role of translation in the transfer of proto-feminist thought between Britain and German-speaking Europe. Johns focuses on four works in particular: Johann David Michaelis's translation of Richardson's Clarissa (1748), Meta Forkel's of Paine's The Rights of Man (1791), Mary Wollstonecraft's of Salzmann's Moralisches Elementarbuch (1795), and Joseph Johnson's of GutsMuths's Gymnastik für die Jugend (1793). For Johns, Michaelis and Forkel demonstrate how English-German translations successfully furthered the cultural, social, and political advancement of women, whereas Wollstonecraft actually serves as a negative foil. Johns convincingly argues that the latter's "Englishing" of Salzmann's [End Page 131] educational tract "undermines her own revolutionary aims" by giving the practical German text a metaphysical, Romantic expression (67). With her discussion of Johnson, Johns tests the limits of the Latourian method. She acknowledges that GutsMuths's text, which outlines a program of physical education for use in schools, does not actively promote a feminist agenda, but argues that it "theoretically left a space for the development of women and people of all classes" (86). Regardless of whether one accepts or rejects this particular argument, the chapter as a whole constitutes a highlight of the book. Brimming with interesting information and insightful analysis, Johns's discussion shows how the choices of translators have "very real implications for transnational understanding and gender politics" (40). Chapter 3 examines the impact of the French Revolution on intra-European travel writing, using gendered descriptions of Mount Vesuvius as a case in point. Johns argues that Vesuvius, a symbolic representation of the social and political turmoil caused by the Revolution, "became a natural locus for debating the concatenation of politics and sexual politics" (97). While men engaged with Vesuvius as an example of the sublime for the purpose of self-fashioning, women travelers contextualized the grandeur of the volcano within "life's eternal landscape" (109), thereby constructing a "feminine sublime" that promoted social connection rather than masculine isolation (112). The argument of this chapter strays from issues of cultural transfer, claiming instead that British and German women travel writers shared the common goal of exposing Vesuvius as a threat. Chapter 4 returns to the theme of British-German cultural transfer as a catalyst...

“Mabel K. Howell: A Modern Apostle,” 1873-1957

Research Article| January 01 2017 “Mabel K. Howell: A Modern Apostle,” 1873-1957 Paul W. Chilcote; Paul W. Chilcote PAUL W. CHILCOTE is Professor of Historical Theology & Wesleyan Studies at Ashland Theological Seminary in Ohio. A specialist in Wesley studies, early Methodist women, and the Methodist heritage, Chilcote has published over twenty books, the most recent of which is A Faith That Sings, which examines the biblical themes in the lyrical theology of Charles Wesley. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Ulrike Schuler Ulrike Schuler ULRIKE SCHULER is Professor of Church History, Methodism, and Ecumenics at the Reutlingen School of Theology in Germany, the historic seminary for Methodists in German-speaking Europe. Schuler has published widely in the areas of European Methodist history, mission, and ecumenical studies, and participates regularly in international and regional ecumenical dialogues. Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Methodist History (2017) 55 (1-2): 108–127. https://doi.org/10.5325/methodisthist.55.1-2.0108 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Twitter Permissions Search Site Citation Paul W. Chilcote, Ulrike Schuler; “Mabel K. Howell: A Modern Apostle,” 1873-1957. Methodist History 1 January 2017; 55 (1-2): 108–127. doi: https://doi.org/10.5325/methodisthist.55.1-2.0108 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All Scholarly Publishing CollectivePenn State University PressMethodist History Search Advanced Search The text of this article is only available as a PDF. Copyright © 2016 by The Pennsylvania State University. All rights reserved.2016The Pennsylvania State University Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

Introduction: The Poetics of Space in the Goethezeit

THE FIELD OF GERMAN STUDIES in twenty-first century has been shaped in no small measure by spatial or topographical turn in sciences and humanities. Two important scholarly anthologies edited on either side of Atlantic indicate breadth of this critical idiom: Topographien der Literatur: Deutsche Literatur im transnationalen Kontext, edited by Hartmut Bohme; and Spatial Turns: Space, Place, and Mobility in German and Visual Culture, edited by Jaimey Fisher and Barbara Mennel.1 Fittingly, in organizing these collections, respective editors have chosen to apply models associated with critical turn in question. Thus, four sections of Bohme's anthology are headed Representations of Discursive Spaces, Spaces of Literature, Literary Spaces, and Borders and Foreign, while four sections of Fisher and Mennel's collection bear headings Mapping Spaces, Spaces of Urban, Spaces of Encounter, and Visualized Space. In their overall organization, these two milestone anthologies thus studiously avoid what Bohme terms classical systems of order, for instance according to periods (IX). In this special section of Goethe Yearbook devoted to poetics of space in Goethezeit, we hope to build on work of these ground-breaking anthologies, while questioning an approach that foregrounds category of space at expense of that of period-whether understood in more traditional sense of Age of Goethe, or Reinhart Koselleck's notion of Sattelzeit, or temporal marker 1800.Within framework of spatial turn, relegation of period to secondary role (Bohme IX) is understandable. Indeed, turn to an analysis of space as a fundamental category arose precisely as a reaction to, and critique of, historicism, in particular Marxian historical dialectic. As Edward Soja writes in Postmodern Geographies: Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory, The critical hermeneutic is still enveloped in a temporal master-narrative, in a historical but not yet comparably geographical imagination.2 Building on twentieth-century thinkers (particularly Michel Foucault and Henri Lefebvre), Soja and other contemporary theoretical geographers (such as Derek Gregory and David Harvey) have challenged the hoary traditions of a space-blinkered historicism and have helped effect far-reaching spatialization of critical imagination (Soja 11).To be sure, Soja's project aims not for displacement of historical by spatial, but rather a that is, formulation of a theory of social being actively emplaced in space and time in an explicitly historical and geographical contextualization (11). In so doing, Soja follows trajectory of Foucault's line of thought as sketched out in his essay Of Other Spaces. Foucault begins by contrasting nineteenth century, with its obsession with history, and present as the epoch of space. But in very next paragraph, he blurs this dichotomy when he contends that the space which today appears to form horizon of our concerns, our theory, our systems is not an innovation; space itself has a history in Western experience and it is not possible to disregard fatal intersection of time with space.3 Foucault never fully resolves this tension in his thought-one moment drawing a sharp distinction between epochs according to their privileging of time or of space; next, collapsing this distinction and bringing into view manner in which space and time are always imbricated.We have assembled following six essays in spirit of Foucault's intersectional thought and Soja's project of rebalancing, with aim of contributing to literary history of a range of personal, social, political, and aesthetic spaces. In so doing, we hope to bring into sharper focus multiple transformations of spatial practices, imaginings, and theories that occurred in German-speaking Europe around 1800. …

Everyday Magic in Early Modern Europe (Kathryn A. Edwards, ed.)

<i>Everyday Magic in Early Modern Europe</i> (Kathryn A. Edwards, ed.)

Chronic Disease Self-management Support for People with a Migrant Background: towards a Peer-led Group Program to Improve Equity in Health

Limited health literacy and language skills are barriers for people with a migrant background (PMB) to access health information and healthcare services, in particular for those living with chronic conditions. During the introduction of a peer-led Stanford chronic disease self-management course in Switzerland, special interest in the program as well as motivation of PMB was observed. In response, we examined if the program can be implemented in German for people with limited language skills. This explorative study is part of the evaluation study on introducing the adapted Stanford program in Switzerland and German-speaking Europe. Following the principles of Grounded Theory, semi-structured focus group and individual interviews were conducted with course participants, leaders and coordinators (n=30) and analyzed thematically. The focus was on the feasibility, satisfaction and course content. In principle, the program seems to have positive value for PMB, may work for them in German, have high relevance for everyday life and give an impetus for social integration. The need for and extent of modification of the program for PMB has to be further explored in order to make it more accessible for vulnerable groups.

German Protestants' Interpretations of George Whitefield, 1739–1857

Abstract From 1739, Europeans began to publish news reports and theological interpretations of the advent of Methodism, which discussed George Whitefield as one of its leaders. The greatest interest in Methodism from beyond the English-speaking world came from German-speaking Europe. There were three main periods in the reception of Whitefield among eighteenth- and nineteenth-century German Protestant scholars and churchmen: the first in the 1740s, the second in the 1790s, and the third during the ‘Awakening’ (Erweckungsbewegung) after the Napoleonic Wars. In each of these periods, Whitefield was perceived to have been a Pietist by both admirers and detractors of Pietism.

Power, jobs and bodies: the experiences of becoming a gender scholar in doctoral education

Research suggests that doctoral students' learning and experiences are influenced by their relationships and predominant organizational norms and structures, create gender inequality and discourage or prevent alternative behaviors. However, there is very little empirical information on the nature of doctoral experiences and organizational activities and processes when an academic program focuses on gender. The study reported here approaches learning as a cognitive and social activity to identify and illuminate events and interaction students describe in becoming scholars as they negotiate their roles and relationships in an interdisciplinary program of gender studies in German-speaking Europe. Three dominant themes or factors shaped students’ experiences: (a) power and tensions associated with it, (b) jobs: discovering what was to be done, and when and how to do it to be successful, and (c) bodies: the doing of gender.