International Workshop and Conference at the German Historical Institute Washington

Conveners: Simone Lässig (GHI) and Matthew Hiebert (GHI) in collaboration with the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media and Digital Humanities at Berkeley

This event brings together into critical dialogue historians from North America, Germany, the international institutes of the Max Weber Foundation, and beyond, to comparatively examine emerging digital approaches, new research problematics, and implications for the discipline of history and its understanding, for those using or producing digital maps to create spatial historical knowledge.  For centuries, historians have provided maps within their work to visualize complex information. With the increasing awareness of spatial dimensions in history and the invention of Geographical Information Systems (GIS), historical research would grant mapping a greater methodological role in processes of research and scientific discovery. Reflecting through the international exchange of ideas upon the impact of digital mapping today on conceptions of history, methodology, Quellenkritik, and theoretical frameworks, offers understanding into how the discipline of history and the knowledge it creates are changing in response to a new digital spatial turn.

The ascendance of neogeography and digital humanities has resulted in a global explosion of scholarly mapping projects that appear to overcome limitations of traditional Historical GIS by utilizing dynamic content to represent temporal change, and through accessible tools to construct independent and crowd-sourced databases often derived from archival materials beyond census data and other forms of official record. Concurrent with these recent historiographical developments, contemporary historical research has given increased focus to the role of print-based maps e.g. in the construction of nations, surpralocal identities, and imperial territorialities. The interest in digitizing such maps and enrich them with metadata and other information useful for scholars is more than apparent at an international level. However, mapping projects are often focused on technological solutions and rarely discuss methodological or theoretical implications for historical scholarship.

To open up opportunities for critical inner-, but also inter-disciplinary theoretical-methodological reflection and comparison, the event seeks to present a large range of methodological approaches and geographic scales and topics. We especially welcome, therefore, proposals that are comparative in scope, projects integrating multiple digital techniques, and approaches operating at multiple spatial and temporal scales. While the overriding concern of the event is mapping within historiography and within history from the Early Modern period to the contemporary, the range of approaches is open and may involve digital humanities, cultural history, political history, history of knowledge, (post)colonial History, urban history, the history of historiography or other critical frameworks. Although research centered on nation-states is relevant, we are particularly interested in the question of how to map transnational and transregional history sufficiently.

We plan for the conference to unfold over three days at the GHI Washington: Thursday (Oct. 20), co-convened with the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media, is dedicated to workshops focused on new methodological approaches and digital tools; Friday (Oct. 21) and Saturday (Oct. 22), co-convened with Digital Humanities at Berkeley, are comprised of panels, roundtable discussions, and lectures.

Please submit proposals by May 15, 2016 for

  1. 20-minutes presentations or
  2. workshops of one hour and forty-five minutes.

Topics and questions that might be addressed include:

  1. Reflecting on the transformation of historical inquiry after the digital spatial turn: How are digital mapping and the digitizing of historical maps impacting knowledge creation in specific areas of historical research and vice versa: What kind of historical data and knowledge (Grundlagenforschung) is available, what is needed when we want to use the full potential of the digital age? In what ways are spatial humanities and digital mapping affecting the nature of historical inquiry? How are new mapping techniques shaping historical narrative and argumentation? 

  2. The impact and challenge of new digital methods for creating spatial historical knowledge: Do emerging digital methods transcend perceived limitations and criticisms of more traditional forms of Historical Geo-Information-Systems (GIS)? Today, how is GIS being productively integrated with neogeography? What are challenges and imperatives in both designing and reading maps as part of scholarly practice? What are the current limitations of digital tools? 

  3. Opportunities and challenges to web-based and citizen science map-oriented research: In what ways are Web 2.0 digital tools facilitating new forms of “spatio-temporal” inquiry?  What are the epistemological implications of a public scholarly mapping project?  What role can and should “citizen scientists” play in these processes?  What are the implications of open digital mapping for research excellence and its assurance? 

  4. Exploring the intersection of digital spatial history and other critical frameworks: How have maps been used by political agents in the construction of national and social identities and what role can digital mapping play in this critique? How should spatial historians approach the political, social, and cultural dimensions of their own online research projects? What relationships pertain or can be forged between other humanities-based critical frameworks and spatial history?
  5. The digital remediation of print-based maps and other spatial source material: How are and should print-based maps be digitally preserved, be made digitally available, and be digitally edited or studied? Which additional information and data will be needed and should be attached/included? What are the key issues and tools surrounding the alignment of historical print-based digitized maps with dynamic ones? 
What are methods, challenges, and results in developing a database from archival sources? Historically, what similarities and dissimilarities pertain between cartography, print-based map design and publication, and emergent digital approaches?

Funding is available to cover travel expenses. In addition to giving a presentation or workshop, participants will submit twenty-page papers for an anthology to be published in 2017. Please submit proposals of no more than 500 words, with a short (1-2 page) CV to Susanne Fabricius.  For further information regarding format and concept of the event please contact Matthew Hiebert. 

Contact Email: 

hiebert at ghi-dc.org