頭脳循環を加速する若手研究者戦略的海外派遣プログラム | 若手研究者派遣-活動報告書

The increasing use of writing in late medieval Europe was for a long time equated with administrative work becoming more rational. More recently, however, one argues in a more differentiated way, viewing e. g. at the connection between the use of writing and the ritual. The lecture asks about how `writing´ was embedded into concrete communicative situations. What is oral interaction capable of achieving, and what changes if writing is included into interaction? – that is the focal question of the lecture.

Firstly, I intend to sketch two modes of the use of writing in the late medieval city. In short, writing may a) serve for representing a group, for providing it with an opportunity to articulate itself as a community. And b) the use of writing may be in generating its own discursive space.

Secondly, I intend to relate these two almost opposite modes of the use of writing to the basic structures of urban society. Probably the former form of communication, i.e. the representation mode, is used most of all within that corporative association called `city´. The latter, on the other hand, is predominantly used between the various associations or communities, such as the citizens and the clerics.

As a conclusion, some reasons for the respective attribution of the two modes shall be given.

This study reveals how the Waldenses sustained their collective consciousness after the nineteenth century. After February 17, 1848, the Waldenses started to expand their parish beyond the Waldensian Valleys, because they were no longer subjected to the dominance of the Catholic Church and the Savoy family, and they finally had the freedom of faith. They did not need to be strongly united against a specific enemy. Their collective consciousness that had been resuscitated in modern times as “the people in the Piedmont Valleys directly evangelized by Saint Paul” disappeared. Valdo of Lyon (1173) was accepted as the origin of the Waldenses based on the demonstration of history (the establishment of Société d'Histoire Vaudoise, renamed as Società di Studi Valdesi in 1931).

Thereafter, the Waldenses began to pay attention to historical facts and establish their historical memory in the Waldensian Valleys by building museums and monuments. Thus, the Waldenses have always existed as the “Waldenses” upon another collective consciousness, known as “the people with a Waldensian history after Valdo of Lyon”, and who have never existed as the Reformed Church or the Methodist Church. However, their collective consciousness is not unified today. While the collective consciousness based on history has been formed amongst the believers born “within” the Valleys, the Valleys are not necessarily the homeland for believers that were born “outside”. For this reason, not all believers have a collective consciousness based on history.

A Singakademie is a mixed choral society of dilettanti, many of which were established in various parts of Germany during the early nineteenth century after the first choral society establishment in Berlin in 1791. It became the center of civic musical life and also played a significant role in developing civic musical culture as well as contributing to charity. Hamburger Singakademie was established in 1819. It began holding public concerts in 1835, and profits raised from the sale of admission tickets and texts were distributed to charities. During that period, the increasing levels of poverty became a serious social problem, and many private charitable organizations were established to support the people affected by poverty. However, it was not a charitable organization that set goals and targets of charity. It decided upon the recipients of the proceeds of a concert before each event. Therefore, this decision was often dependent on time, the city’s social situation, and its members' interests, namely the citizens of Hamburg.

This presentation will demonstrate the recipients of proceeds raised by the charity concerts of the Singakademie from 1835 to 1914, and also consider changes in the Singakademie’s views as well as its changing interests in society during that period. The research was based on the proceedings of the Singakademie.

This study explores the path of one of the communities in Berlin from the Weimar period to the present by focusing on the forest settlement on the outskirts of Berlin, which was designed by a German architect named Bruno Taut in the late 1920s. When many architects started a new trend in construction during the 1920s, which they named “Modernist Architecture,” the construction of houses for masses developed rapidly in Europe. In 1928, the forest settlement inhabitants established the Zehlendorf Fischtalgrund Residents’ Association. Starting from 1929, this association organized the annual Fischtal Festival aiming to build facilities for youth. Along with the forest settlement residents, people from all over Berlin enjoyed the festival as well. When the Nazis came into power in 1933, the Residents’ Association was commanded to separate, and the Fischtal Festival was also discontinued. Today, thanks to continuous efforts since the 1970s to restore the original state of the forest settlement, people can enjoy the architecture that was created by Bruno Taut, but in a different context from the time when it was constructed.

Locations in a geographical or social sense have vanished from standard economics. While it was the aim of Adam Smith and others to explore the reasons for the Wealth of Nations it is in times of Globalisation a common place that Localities are of minor importance. Everything is accessible and transferable from everywhere with no serious time lags. 

However, Paul Krugman has called for a new attention to Localities and tries to develop a New Economic Geography beyond geographical or Nation State containers. Similar attempts reach from Michael Porters Cluster concept to Neil Fligstein Market Field approach. They all agree that Locations matter! However, they remain mainly in a world of rational and strategy guided actors. However, these actors are not only guided by Institutions, Networks, and Cognitions. These do shape market fields and can be understood as stabilising elements of Localities. Furthermore, the reciprocal interaction at arm’s-length can help to create solutions for collective action problems through the creation of public goods.