German World Research Articles

Navigating Age Diversity in Volunteer Teams: Barriers and Enablers of Teamwork

Despite demographic change leading to increased age diversity among volunteers, extant research offers limited guidance on how organizations can manage age-diverse volunteer teams. In this study, we delve into the dynamics of age diversity in a volunteer context by analyzing the case of German World Shops. We collected extensive ethnographic and interview data from age-diverse volunteer teams over a period of 2.5 years. In our analysis, we identified three overarching barriers to age-diverse teamwork—resistance to change and innovation, communication preferences, and power dynamics—and three enablers—creating space to experiment, ensuring protected spaces, and fostering spaces of encounter. In doing so, we contribute to the existing literature on diversity in volunteering and offer guidance for volunteer coordinators to foster collaboration and the build-up of relational capital among volunteers to create successful age-diverse volunteer teams. Moreover, this research opens avenues for further exploration into this emerging and critical phenomenon.

The сoncept of the national culture in German romanticism: Sourсes and historical background

In Novalis’s works, the reaction of German Romanticism to the Enlightenment was civilizational: By the German world, both the French monarchy and Republic were viewed in a negative light. Thus, the Novalis’s philosophy developed the concept of national culture, which the movement “Storm and Onslaught”, led by J. G. Herder, opposed to French classicism of the 17th–18th centuries. According to Herder, the folk’s culture is formed through the psychological exploration of nature in myths and folklore, fixed in language. The “organic nature” of culture links folklore with the Middle Age and Modern poetry as the new forms of the dialogue with nature. This idea was consolidated by the figure of Faust, chosen by the Sturmers and Goethe as the hero of the “masterpiece” summarizing the national poetic path. Novalis elevated Catholicism to the cult of the earth, and the collective mind was connected with it by magic. He saw the institution of this union as an “ideal” Prussia where self-knowledge unites citizens, and the monarch unites the people and nature as an esoteric master. The French monarchy divided the people by cultivating selfishness. The prerequisites of this opinion were indicated by J. Le Goff and L. Karsavin who stated the existence of two types of cultures, which emerged as a result of the Roman conquest of Europe. For the national ones, who retained their languages and with them the connection with pre–Roman mythology and folklore, the introduced ancient norm and Christianity became forms of self-development. For the newly emerged unities west of the Rhine, they became the foundation of the cultural convention.

“Mental map” in “Letters of a Russian Traveler” by Nikolay Karamzin and the problem of the national myth representation

The article analyzes “Letters of a Russian Traveler” by Nikolay Karamzin in terms of the symbolic-mythological perception of space, suggesting a view of the countries, depicted in the travelogue, as symbolic-mythological units of the “mental map” in the book. A “mental map” is understood as a holistic image of a geographical space, value-restructured in accordance with the author’s vision of European cultural and the historical situation. The purpose of the work is to reveal the hidden additional plot of Karamzin’s book, which determines the logic of the perception of geographical space and its comprehension, taking into account the historical and political situation witnessed by Karamzin’s hero-traveler. Using the methodology of the structural-semiotic, historical-genetic and comparative-typological reading of the text, as well as the methodology of human geography, the article shows how Karamzin generalizes ideas about the logic of the Western European history and culture development at the end of the 18th century. We also characterize the writer’s symbolic and mythological view of the cultural dialogue between Russia and Europe, the place and role of the “Letters...” of France, Switzerland, England and the countries of the German world on the “mental map”. Conclusions are drawn about the significance of the spatial image of “Letters...” for the design of Karamzin’s historical and political concept of the late 18th century, in which the key role was played by the ideas of the dialogue, the ability to evaluate the achievements of European culture and to develop the potential of Russian culture.

How Icelandic Is French Law? A Few Remarks about the Discovery and Usage of Icelandic Antiquities in French Legal Historiography during the Nineteenth Century

How Icelandic Is French Law? A Few Remarks about the Discovery and Usage of Icelandic Antiquities in French Legal Historiography during the Nineteenth Century

Botanical Dissertations from the 19th and Early 20th Centuries at the Ohio State University Herbarium (OS)

Botanical Dissertations from the 19th and Early 20th Centuries at the Ohio State University Herbarium (OS)

Mackinder's “heartland” – legitimation of US foreign policy in World War II and the Cold War of the 1950s

Abstract. The British geographer Halford J. Mackinder developed two different concepts of a dystopian new global order. The first, developed in 1904 and known as the pivot area concept, was adopted by German geopolitician Karl Haushofer in the 1920s. The second, developed in 1919, was named the heartland theory and was adopted in Great Britain and the USA. Haushofer reversed the dystopian vision of the pivot area concept into a utopian concept for German world power. Due to Haushofer's adaptation, interest in Mackinder's theories rose in the USA in the 1940s. Within the process of adaptation in the USA, both concepts were intertwined, resulting in the perception of the two as a monolithic bloc. Through this multi-layered process of intercontinental reception and adaptation in Germany and the USA, the term “heartland” became a generic spatial denomination detached from the geographical region it originally prescribed, integrable with various geopolitical concepts as the centre of an imagined world order. The reduction of complexity of the theory through the translation of text into maps led to its popularization among the US public during the 1940s and 1950s. Mackinder himself laid out the flexibility of the theory's interpretive possibilities by reflexively revising the theory and adapting it to the history of events over the course of the first half of the 20th century itself. In consequence, the generic spatial denomination “heartland” and the associated adopted theory served as a geopolitical argument for the strategic narrative legitimizing US foreign policy in World War II and during the Cold War.

Warship wrecks and their munition cargos as a threat to the marine environment and humans: The V 1302 "JOHN MAHN" from World War II.

In addition to endangering sea traffic, cable routes, and wind farms, sunken warship wrecks with dangerous cargo, fuel, or munitions on board may emerge as point sources for environmental damage. Energetic compounds such as TNT (which could leak from these munitions) are known for their toxicity, mutagenicity, and carcinogenicity. These compounds may cause potential adverse effects on marine life via contamination of the marine ecosystem, and their entry into the marine and human food chain could directly affect human health. To ascertain the impending danger of an environmental catastrophe posed by sunken warships, the North Sea Wrecks (NSW) project (funded by the Interreg North Sea Region Program) was launched in 2018. Based on historical data (derived from military archives) including the calculated amount of munitions still on board, its known location and accessibility, the German World War II ship "Vorpostenboot 1302" (former civilian name - "JOHN MAHN") was selected as a case study to investigate the leakage and distribution of toxic explosives in the marine environment. The wreck site and surrounding areas were mapped in great detail by scientific divers and a multibeam echosounder. Water and sediment samples were taken in a cross-shaped pattern around the wreck. To assess a possible entry into the marine food chain, caged mussels were exposed at the wreck, and wild fish (pouting), a sedentary species that stays locally at the wreck, were caught. All samples were analyzed for the presence of TNT and derivatives thereof by GC-MS/MS analysis. As a result, we could provide evidence that sunken warship wrecks emerge as a point source of contamination with nitroaromatic energetic compounds leaking from corroding munitions cargo still on board. Not only did we find these explosive substances in bottom water and sediment samples around the wreck, but also in the caged mussels as well as in wild fish living at the wreck. Fortunately so far, the concentrations found in mussel meat and fish filet were only in the one-digit ng per gram range thus indicating no current concern for the human seafood consumer. However, in the future the situation may worsen as the corrosion continues. From our study, it is proposed that wrecks should not only be ranked according to critical infrastructure and human activities at sea, but also to the threats they pose to the environment and the human seafood consumer.

Османська імперія у рецепції Т. Ґ. Масарика у період Першої світової війни

The article is devoted to the issue of Czech politician T. G. Masaryk’s perception of the Ottoman Empire during the World War I. It is noted that T. G. Masaryk perceived the World War I as a crisis of European civilization, the political content of which he considered the struggle of democratic countries (the Entente) and the theocratic ones (Germany and its allies). Being in exile since December 1914, T. G. Masaryk led the liberation movement of the Czechs and Slovaks. Seeking support for the independence of the stateless nations of Central and Eastern Europe, T. G. Masaryk in his memoranda to the politicians of the Entente countries, public speeches, and writings paid considerable attention to criticizing empires from the Central States and, in particular, the Ottoman Empire, which he considered remnants of the past, undemocratic and anti-national. T. G. Masaryk assessed the Ottoman Empire as a theocratic state in decline, and considered The Young Turk regime to be the new incarnation of the military essence of the Turkish state. He saw the basis of the union of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire in the internal similarity of their political regimes. The scholar assumed that the reason for Turkey’s entry into the World War I on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary was the desire of the country’s leadership to keep Istanbul and the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, to revive the former imperial position in North Africa. In the context of the analysis of Berlin’s Pan-German foreign program, he pointed out that one of its goals was an alliance with the Ottoman Empire as a key means of penetrating the Middle East. T. G. Masaryk viewed Germany’s hegemony in Central Europe in connection with the strengthening of its position in the Middle East, which he considered part of the process of becoming the strongest colonial power. He believed that a Pan-German alternative to the Eastern question would lead to German world domination. Analyzing the strategy of German colonial policy and the place of the Ottoman Empire in it, T. G. Masaryk expressed his vision of the expedient plans of the Allies for the Ottoman state. He advocated the deprivation of Turkey of its European possessions. As for Istanbul and the Straits, Masaryk’s position changed. At first, he supported their transfer to Russia, and after its exit from the war – under the temporary international control of the Entente countries until the final resolution of the issue of their state affiliation.

Racial discrimination, objectalisation and reactive disobjectalisation—Pathways of integration for young Muslims in Germany

AbstractThis paper aims to investigate the relationship between contending objectalisation, reactive disobjectalisation and radicalization tendencies during the integration of 50 young Muslims in Germany. The largest group of people who have a history of migration in Germany are people of Turkish and Kurdish origin. During the summer and autumn of 2018, we interviewed 50 individuals from both genders aged from 18 to 25 years old. We saw that negative or contending objectalisation could lead to a reactive disobjectalisation of the German world. This reactively results in an increased occupation of Turkish culture, especially religion and radicalization, which focuses the intensification of religious views. As a result of this process, religious behavior intensifies, which is shaped by going to religious groups, mosques and activities in Islamic organizations. There also appears to be some kind of “new national feeling” where objectalisation of both cultures results in a third identity in the form of its own psychic integration. In this way a new migratory identity would be formed which inherits the “best of both cultures.”

Review: On the Importance of Military Geoscience

Review: On the Importance of Military Geoscience

Controlling Voices in Fourteenth-Century Salzburg: Singing and Identity in the ‘MÖnch von Salzburg’ Songs

ABSTRACT The songs attributed to the so-called ‘Mönch von Salzburg’ offer a vivid picture of the late fourteenth-century ecclesiastical court of Archbishop Pilgrim von Pucheim. Against the background of historical and legal documentation from Salzburg, this article explores the way these songs negotiate the desires and anxieties of a mixed clerical-courtly milieu with a particular concern for regulating the human voice in both artistic and social senses. Taking as my central example Dy trumpet, one of the earliest pieces of recorded secular polyphony in the German world, I examine how both the singing and composition of song at Pilgrim’s court offered ways to certify one’s vocal interventions as positive and thereby to assure curial kudos. In a final section, I consider how later, non-curial recipients of these songs were able to vehicularize these courtly voices to their own advantage.

Age Diversity in Volunteer Teams: A Qualitative Study on Age-Diverse Teamwork

Demographic changes and an aging workforce challenge organizations by amplifying the impacts of age diversity on teamwork. While previous research focused on age diversity in professional teams, this study sheds light on the dynamics of teamwork in age-diverse volunteer teams. Our empirical analysis draws from the case of German World Shops, which sell fair trade goods. We collected extensive ethnographic and interview data from age-diverse volunteer teams. We identified three overarching barriers to (resistance towards change, communications preferences, power dynamics) and three enablers of (creating space to experiment, ensuring protected spaces, fostering spaces of encounter) age-diverse teamwork. Our analysis suggests that younger volunteers were thwarted by a larger and more powerful group of older volunteers. Moreover, the older volunteers showed a considerable aversion to change, despite their volunteer engagement to bring about change in trade. Beyond developing the respective concepts, this study extends the literature on volunteering by integrating the perspective of age diversity, offers practical solutions to improve collaboration in volunteering and paves the way for further research to explore the nascent phenomenon.

Origin of Symmetrical Composition in Decorative Art of the Viking Age

For the first time, a symmetrical composition with figures of a deity standing on the godsof carnivorous animals appeared in the Middle Eastern art of the III–II millennium B.C. In the Mycenaean era, this composition became known to adherents of Hellenic art, who realized it both in painting and sculpture. This composition realizes the idea of their authors striving to convey to recipients the concept of the power of the depicted deity and his power over the animal world. A symmetrical composition with standing predatory animals, which is a clear
 oriental innovation in the art of ancient Europe, was not represented on our continent in ancient and Hellenistic times. As a result of the gradual increase in the eastern influence on the art of late Rome, symmetry again became known to Europeans in
 the products of provincial-Roman masters of the 5th century A.D. In late antiquity, goldsmiths in the Roman provinces used this composition on the parts of military belt sets. These images became models for the ancient German masters who represented
 the God Wotan / Odin surrounded by mythical animals and birds dedicated to him.
 The decorative art of the Viking Age, alien to symmetry, retains it only in the plot of the pagan canon «Odin and the Crows». Variants of this «pagan icon», realized in the decorative art of the Viking Age, came to an end in the Germanic world of a
 composition with symmetrically located predators, which began in the Ancient East
 in Akkadian time. In this case, we have a unique example of the multi-thousand-year existence of the pictorial motive, used by jewelers and stonecutters to make impressive images of mystical creatures. The predators surrounding them were intended to
 symbolize the unearthly power of the deities.In Byzantium, a symmetrical composition remained relevant until the XIV
 century. Modern and contemporary historypreserves paired images of predators in heraldic and architectural compositions. However, their genetic relationship with Ancient Eastern images requires additional study.

Германия и Евросоюз: движущая сила или риск гегемонии?

The German position has played a central role in the European integration process from the earliest stages – both in the sense of strengthening and deepening integration and, especially after the adoption of the single currency, in that of imposing a particularly rigid economic and financial paradigm, while being accused by some member states of pursuing a hegemonic design that could even lead to a serious crisis in the Union. A heated debate has developed on this interpretation, not lacking in political polemics, which calls for a more in-depth assessment of the determinants of Bonn’s and then Berlin’s European policy, of the relationship between the choices considering integration and general lines of the German foreign policy as they develop. In addition, the theme of Reunification and, in parallel, of national identity, that have decisively conditioned the life of post‑1945 Germany, is crucial. In particular, it is interesting to note how Bonn made Western anchorage, both in the transatlantic and EU spheres, some of the cornerstones of its system, while at the same time, skilfully exploiting these choices to regain a place on the international scene. With reunification of 1990, Germany regained full sovereignty and tenaciously worked to assert its role as the continent’s Zentralmacht (central power) – a role that has been characteristic of the Germanic world since the Holy Roman Empire. This determination, albeit in different tones and colours, has seen substantial continuity between the CDU/CSU, the Social Democrats and Greens, and then with the “Gro.e Koalitionen” led by Angela Merkel. “Extraordinary responsibility”, “pivot”, “engine”, “vanguard”, “centre of gravity” are the different definitions that chancellors and foreign ministers have used in the last 30 years to define Berlin’s role within the European Union. Different expressions, but always intended to emphasise a special position and declined in such a way as to be useful to Germany’s “Vitalinteressen”, whether it was a question of the enlargement of the Union, its legal structure, the principle of subsidiarity or the creation of monetary union. It resulted, though not without contradictions, in a shift from the idea of “europaisches Deutschland” (European Germany) to that of “europaisches Deutschland in einem deutschen Europa” (European Germany in a German Europe). This contribution is devoted to the historical and political dynamics of this development.

Tolkien and the Classical World ed. by Hamish Williams, and: Tolkien and the Classics ed. by Roberto Arduini

Reviewed by: Tolkien and the Classical World ed. by Hamish Williams, and: Tolkien and the Classics ed. by Roberto Arduini Victor Parker Tolkien and the Classical World, edited by Hamish Williams. Zurich: Walking Tree Publishers, 2021. Cormarë series no. 45. xxvi, 414 pp. $32.00 (softcover). ISBN 978-3-905703-45-0. Tolkien and the Classics, edited by Roberto Arduini, Giampaolo Canzonieri, and Claudio A. Testi. Zurich: Walking Tree Publishers, 2019. Cormarë series no. 42. xix, 245 pp. $24.30 (softcover). ISBN 978-3-905703-42-9. Investigation of Tolkien's quarrying of medieval literature for his own works has been proceeding apace with good results for some time now. Tolkien and the Classical World focuses on the less developed study of Tolkien's use of classical (i.e., Greek and Roman) literature.1 Unfortunately, two methodological problems stand in the way. The first has to do with classical literature's pervasive influence during the medieval period. When Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings describes the siege of a great, walled city ruled by an aging man who does not himself fight and therefore relies on his son(s) to defend it, of course one thinks of Troy. But did Tolkien have in mind the Iliad itself or Roman retellings (e.g., that in Vergil's Aeneid) or medieval retellings (e.g., the Geste Historial of the Destruction of Troy on which he worked when compiling the glossary for Kenneth Sisam's Fourteenth Century Verse and Prose)? Or all of them at once or some combination thereof?2 Second, even when there is no direct link between a potential classical and a medieval source, either is often just as likely to have been an inspiration as the other. In The Lord of the Rings the Stewards of Gondor maintain a network of beacons. So did the kings of classical Persia ([Aristotle], De mundo, 398a), but then again so did the kings of medieval Norway (Snorri, Heimskringla, 4, 21); and Tolkien could have been thinking of either (or both).3 Before turning to commentary on specific essays, let me first characterize the volume as a whole. After a spirited introduction by Hamish Williams, it is divided into five sections: "Classical Lives and Histories" (Tolkien as a classical scholar as well as the influence on Tolkien of interpretations of classical history in regard to Númenor); "Ancient Epic and Myth" (focusing on Homer, Vergil, and the myth of Orpheus); "In Dialogue with Greek Philosophers" (Plato and [End Page 205] Aristotle); "Around the Borders of the Classical World" (largely the interactions of the Germanic world with the classical); and "Shorter Remarks and Observations" (one essay on pastoralism and one on music). Apart from the last catch-all these divisions are logical and hang together well. A useful Afterword closes the collection; there is also an index. Each individual essay at least shows that Tolkien could have drawn on the classical sources discussed, whether directly or indirectly; and all the essays are conducive to further discussion. In this way already the authors collectively provide a useful companion to Tom Shippey's studies on Tolkien's use of medieval literature, though there is still some distance to go before scholarship on Tolkien's use of classical sources reaches the level found there or in the volume edited by Jane Chance, Tolkien the Medievalist. That said, the essays in the volume here under review are much stronger when they discuss the classical sources directly (see, e.g., Peter Astrup Sundt's essay on Orpheus and Michael Kleu's on Plato and Atlantis) than when they rely on generalizations and summary analyses drawn from recent secondary scholarship which Tolkien himself could not possibly have known. It is, however, a different matter entirely when, for instance, Philip Burton discusses scholarship which Tolkien almost certainly worked with professionally (275). More work probably needs to be done on what sorts of secondary books on the Classical world Tolkien is likely to have read before this approach becomes fruitful. Finally, some of the essays content themselves with merely pointing to the presence of possible classical sources of inspiration, whereas the stronger ones attempt to demonstrate direct use.4 Under this...

Summoning Aratron

Abstract The article concerns a German magic roll of ca. 1700: Oxford, Bodleian Library, Bodley MS. Germ. F. (5) R. It was compiled and written chiefly in German, with some Latin and Hebrew, for a gentleman or aristocrat, referenced and portrayed within the roll, to serve both as a textual amulet and prayer roll. The complex text is based on celestial spirits, seals and sigils, and Christian prayer, apotropaic texts, and religious imagery. The article discusses the Bodley roll’s provenance, internal organization, compilation, source texts, Paracelsian and other influences, and its hybrid function as a way to understand how magic survived and evolved in the Germanic world during the Age of Reason.

In the Twilight of Electromechanical Encryption, an Exceptional Machine Figured in a Major Spy Scandal

Growing up in New York City, I always wanted to be a spy. But when I graduated from college in January 1968, the Cold War and Vietnam War were raging, and spying seemed like a risky career choice. So I became an electrical engineer, working on real-time spectrum analyzers for a U.S. defense contractor. In 1976, during a visit to the Polish Army Museum in Warsaw, I saw an Enigma, the famous German World War II cipher machine. I was fascinated. Some years later, I had the good fortune of visiting the huge headquarters of the cipher machine company Crypto AG (CAG), in Steinhausen, Switzerland, and befriending a high-level cryptographer there. My friend gave me an internal history of the company written by its founder, Boris Hagelin. It mentioned a 1963 cipher machine, the HX-63.

German-Polish experience, encounter, contact and dialogue in the Europeanising pedagogy of Andrzej Jaczewski and Karl-Josef Kluge

The shared pedagogy of Andrzej Jaczewski and Karl-Josef Kluge grew out of the political and social changes taking place in West Germany after 1968. Their pioneering work focused on international integration, participation, intercultural learning, educating the gifted, giving space to creativity, and building leadership skills. The international pedagogical interactions initiated at that time were primarily the result of Andrzej Jaczewski’s long life journey marked first by German aggression and World War II and later by his conciliatory response to the postwar West German peace impulse. More than half a thousand participants in German-Polish encounters experienced transformative contact and spaces for dialogue in the Europeanising integration current despite the Cold War. We are reconstructing the shape of this experience and its immediate and distant effects by analysing documents, recording oral histories and describing our own autobiographical encounter experience in the stream of humanistically oriented social sciences. Our exchange of ideas was carried out in 2019–2021 remotely and during study visits to Berlin, Kraków, and Andrzej Jaczewski’s home in Ropki. With this article we contribute to the critical debate on the superficiality of the currently proposed education based on behavioural control in a barren and alienated education system. We advocate a pedagogy that prioritises individual freedom, more vibrant communities, increased autonomy, and cosmopolitanism.

Automatic Road Extraction from Historical Maps Using Deep Learning Techniques: A Regional Case Study of Turkey in a German World War II Map

Scanned historical maps are available from different sources in various scales and contents. Automatic geographical feature extraction from these historical maps is an essential task to derive valuable spatial information on the characteristics and distribution of transportation infrastructures and settlements and to conduct quantitative and geometrical analysis. In this research, we used the Deutsche Heereskarte 1:200,000 Türkei (DHK 200 Turkey) maps as the base geoinformation source to construct the past transportation networks using the deep learning approach. Five different road types were digitized and labeled to be used as inputs for the proposed deep learning-based segmentation approach. We adapted U-Net++ and ResneXt50_32×4d architectures to produce multi-class segmentation masks and perform feature extraction to determine various road types accurately. We achieved remarkable results, with 98.73% overall accuracy, 41.99% intersection of union, and 46.61% F1 score values. The proposed method can be implemented in DHK maps of different countries to automatically extract different road types and used for transfer learning of different historical maps.

War, Coal, and Forced Labor: Assessing the Impact of Prisoner-of-War Employment on Coal Mine Productivity in World War I Germany

This paper assesses the causal relationship between POW assignments and labor productivity for a vital sector of the German World War I economy, namely coal mining. Prisoners of war (POWs) provided significant labor. Combining data on all Ruhr mines with a treatment-effects approach, I find that POW employment alone accounted for 36 percent of the average POW-employing mine’s annual productivity decline over wartime. Estimates also suggest that the representative POW’s productivity averaged 32 percent of the representative regular miner’s productivity and that POWs’ contribution to wartime coal output amounted to 3.9 percent. Violence did not serve as a powerful work incentive.