University Museums, Archives and Collections Placement (Non-UROP)
Department: German Studies, Languages and European Studies
Supervised by: Dr. Ute Wölfel
The placement is at the German Department’s Centre of East German Studies, a research centre within the School of Modern Languages to which all members of the Department contribute and which in return feeds into the Department’s teaching. As CEGS has acquired large amounts of new material recently and is in the process of transformation due to new research interests on the one hand and growing interest in the Centre from outside on the other, a student placement would be an invaluable support of the necessary changes we are currently undertaking with regard to the organisation of the collection as well as our web presence. With a student helping with both the collection and the creation of a new website CEGS would be able to offer more and better services to and strengthen its standing within the academic community. With the most important part of the new material filed and the new website created, the archivist would be able to keep the collection and information on the web updated.
The student would have two major fields of work, first the archiving of new material, particularly press cuttings and video cassettes, and second the creation of the Centre’s new website. The first task would be supervised by the Centre’s archivist, Mrs Ros Furley, and may include cooperation with the University’s Museums and Collections Services which we are currently negotiating with about our collection. The second task would be prepared by a two-day IT workshop that would introduce the student to working with the Content Management System. This task would comprise the transfer of existing information from the old to the new website as well as a general redesign of our web presence by creating new categories, uploading new material and researching and compiling new information which would be supervised by the head of the Centre, Dr Ute Wölfel.
The student would need good knowledge of German and good IT skills
The placement offers the opportunity to boost research skills as it includes researching, collecting, structuring and presenting of different kinds of primary and secondary sources. As an introduction to archiving, it would also be an excellent practice in working with special collections. Furthermore, the placement would be a valuable chance to develop IT skills and discuss formal IT knowledge in connection with content, which would help to develop a more conscious and confident use of the internet as a source of research. Last but not least, as the placement is at the Centre of East German Studies, the student would get a more profound knowledge of topics and research issues related to East Germany and unified Germany.
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Details from PI.