PhD project
Part of the collaborative research project “Where the Rich Live: Mapping Villa Neigh-borhoods and Cultures of Wealth in Germany’s Long 20th Century (RichMap),” conducted in partnership with the Leibniz Institute for Research on Society and Space (IRS) in Erkner
As part of the doctoral project, selected villa districts in Potsdam, Dresden and Görlitz will be studied in relation to the period between 1945 and 2000. The focus will be on changes within the districts brought about by the end of the war in 1945 and German reunification in 1990. These changes affected the social structure, ownership, construction, renovation and demolition activities, as well as the settlement or displacement of people and institutions. Particular attention will be paid to whether neighbourhoods were places of social inequality and asymmetrical power relations under different political systems.
The project is a cultural history of the area that aims to examine the interaction between social space and the built environment, as well as reconstructing everyday life within the villa districts. To this end, extensive source material from public and private archives will be used. Visual sources, such as photographs and floor plans of the villas, will be given particular attention. This material will be supplemented by qualitative interviews with contemporary witnesses.
First supervisor of the doctoral project: Prof. Dr. Frank Bösch, ZZF Potsdam; second supervisor: PD Dr. Eva Maria Gajek, IRS Erkner
