DIW Berlin: Masterclass – The Role of Memory in Economics and History

Masterclass – The Role of Memory in Economics and History

Termin

6. April 2022

Ort

ONLINE via Zoom

Sprecher*innen

Ute Röschenthaler, Mainz University

Zum Kalender hinzufügen

Program

How are individual and collective memories of extreme economic moments produced in a community? How do these memories translate into the political economy and shape the realm of possibility of macroeconomic policies? Why is some statistical data and economic policy represented more factual than other in the historical narration of national economies? How do some economic indicators become more powerful symbolic frameworks than others and receive different degrees of affective intensity? How can methods and key concepts of memory studies inform and enrich the historical and economics analysis related to these questions?

Online Event

The masterclass will take place via Zoom Meeting.

Keynote Lectures

Ute Röschenthaler, Universität Mainz, will give a keynote lecture on "Commemoration, Objectification and Silencing in African Memory Cultures" and provide valuable input during the discussions.

The Workshop is organised by Stephanie Ettmeier and Marie Huber, Post Doctoral Research Fellow in Global History at the HU Berlin. Taking our own research projects – dealing with the postcolonial economy of Francophone West Africa, and the recovery of the German economy from the Great Depression under the Nazis from 1933 onwards, respectively – as a starting point, we want to invite others working on economic experiences and expectations to discuss these questions with us. In a critical thinking and discussion focused workshop format we want to strengthen interdisciplinary conversation and provide methodological impulses for a broad range of research topics.

Goals

The concept of memory takes the masterclass' center stage. By submitting a short essay to the workshop, participants have the chance to reflect in an interdisciplinary discussion the role of memory in their own research to further the methodological and analytical foundation of their projects. On a general basis, our workshop wants to contribute to the methodology of analyzing expectations and experience in economic research and find better ways to integrate social and historical background for analyzing them. The interdisciplinary dialogue in our workshop is helpful for both, historically and economically trained researchers:

Historians get the chance to reflect on processes of selection, convergence and transfer of knowledge in relation to economic policies and statistical tools. Economists get the chance to reflect and contextualize the behavior of economic agents against an historical and sociological background. Learning about each other’s methods and questions is key and guides the workshop’s dialogue. Preliminary research ideas, which still lack a concrete methodological approach, are welcome to be taken up in the essay.

We invite all interested persons to submit till January 2022 to settmeier@diw.de.