Kick-off Meeting in Berlin (June 7-10, 2023)

- by Tadek Wojtych

In early June 2023, the project team convened for the first time in the beautiful surroundings of summery Berlin. Braving the scorching sun, we visited six different museums, discussed research plans, and – perhaps most importantly – got to know each other in person.

The exhibitions we visited all had a different take on democracy. Some, like ‘Berlin Global’ at the Humboldt Forum, approached democracy through the prism of diversity. Others – like the Forum Willi Brand and the ‘Roads not Taken’ exhibition at the DHM – had a more historical take on the key ideas, practices, and actors associated with democracy. Yet others, such as the Documentation Centre ‘Displacement, Expulsion, Reconciliation’ and the German Resistance Memorial Centre, defined democracy through its opposites: dictatorship, coercion, and exclusion. The exhibitions approached both the subject matter and the visitors in very different ways; all, however, were useful case studies at this early stage of our research.

We all joined the project team with different backgrounds, research foci, and questions we sought to answer. I find this diversity inspiring, and I feel that it will undoubtedly enrich our project. At the same time, this first get-together (as well as another one in Newcastle, in August 2023) helped us to narrow down our research questions, decide on the preliminary case studies, and make more concrete research plans for the months and years to come.

Photo: Susannah Eckersley

Last modified: Mon, 05 Feb 2024 14:21:35 GMT