Project acronym KnowStudents
Project From East to West, and Back Again: Student Travel and Transcultural Knowledge Production in Renaissance Europe (c. 1470- c. 1620)
Researcher (PI) Valentina LEPRI
Host Institution (HI) INSTYTUT FILOZOFII I SOCJOLOGII POLSKIEJ AKADEMII NAUK
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH6, ERC-2019-COG
Summary This project is the first comprehensive study of transcultural knowledge production in early modern Europe. Its underpinning idea is that the students who travelled from central-eastern Europe to attend renowned universities were active agents of this transcultural knowledge. During their stays abroad they created personal hand-written notebooks containing lecture notes and any other texts that attracted their interest. Conserved in the archives of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine, these notebooks provide us with unique and first-hand documentary evidence of the impact of multiple cultural stimuli on knowledge. Combining intellectual history, history of migration and physical analysis of documents, the project will consider the period from the rise of this practice among students, due to an unprecedented availability of paper (c. 1470), up to the Thirty Years’ War, which restricted their travels. Its objectives are to analyse: the relationship between academic and non-academic knowledge gathered in the students’ notebooks; the emergence of new forms of self-learning, examining the criteria of text selection; and the contact between humanist culture and the cultures of the countries the students came from. Early modern studies of knowledge production have traditionally focused on academic teaching. Although the cosmopolitan nature of universities is an established fact in these studies, the impact of different cultures (languages, artistic-literary interests, religious practices) on knowledge creation has been neglected, due to lack of evidence. Students’ experience makes it possible to observe links between knowledge and a plurality of languages and traditions which best reflects the European scenario at the time. The project will explore knowledge creation from an unprecedented angle, fostering a rethinking of the notion of centre and peripheries in Renaissance studies and breaking important new ground for research on intellectual history.
Summary
This project is the first comprehensive study of transcultural knowledge production in early modern Europe. Its underpinning idea is that the students who travelled from central-eastern Europe to attend renowned universities were active agents of this transcultural knowledge. During their stays abroad they created personal hand-written notebooks containing lecture notes and any other texts that attracted their interest. Conserved in the archives of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine, these notebooks provide us with unique and first-hand documentary evidence of the impact of multiple cultural stimuli on knowledge. Combining intellectual history, history of migration and physical analysis of documents, the project will consider the period from the rise of this practice among students, due to an unprecedented availability of paper (c. 1470), up to the Thirty Years’ War, which restricted their travels. Its objectives are to analyse: the relationship between academic and non-academic knowledge gathered in the students’ notebooks; the emergence of new forms of self-learning, examining the criteria of text selection; and the contact between humanist culture and the cultures of the countries the students came from. Early modern studies of knowledge production have traditionally focused on academic teaching. Although the cosmopolitan nature of universities is an established fact in these studies, the impact of different cultures (languages, artistic-literary interests, religious practices) on knowledge creation has been neglected, due to lack of evidence. Students’ experience makes it possible to observe links between knowledge and a plurality of languages and traditions which best reflects the European scenario at the time. The project will explore knowledge creation from an unprecedented angle, fostering a rethinking of the notion of centre and peripheries in Renaissance studies and breaking important new ground for research on intellectual history.
Max ERC Funding
1 737 225 €
Duration
Start date: 2020-11-01, End date: 2025-10-31
Project acronym LABFER
Project Globalisation- and Technology-Driven Labour Market Change and Fertility
Researcher (PI) Anna MATYSIAK
Host Institution (HI) UNIWERSYTET WARSZAWSKI
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH3, ERC-2019-COG
Summary LABFER is the first project that will LABFER is the first project that will comprehensively describe and evaluate fertility consequences of the unprecedented changes in the labour market, caused by digitalisation and globalisation. These changes have been taking place during the last three decades and intensified after the Great Recession. They are reflected in: rising demand for skills, massive worker displacement, spread of new work arrangements, increasing work demands and growing inequalities in labour market prospects between the low-and-medium and the highly skilled. They are likely driving the post-crisis fertility decline in the most advanced nations, which is to date not understood. LABFER is thus highly relevant and timely. It has four main objectives:
1) to study the impact of the ongoing labour market change on fertility (macro-level);
2) to examine the individual-level mechanisms behind the observed macro-level fertility effects of the ongoing labour market change;
3) to investigate the role of the growing inequalities between the low-and-medium and the highly skilled for the relative fertility patterns of the two groups;
4) to study the role of family and employment policies in moderating the fertility effects of the labour market change.
Our methodological approach is innovative. We will link data at several layers of observation (country, region, industry, firm, couple and individual) to account for the policy, work and family context of childbearing. We will also use novel labour market measures to capture the ongoing labour market change. Mixture cure models will be employed to separate the effects of covariates on birth timing and probability that the birth occurs.
LABFER will break the ground by providing understanding of how the dynamic labour market changes are associated with and potentially affect the current and future fertility dynamics and its socio-economic gradients. It will also have implications for family and employment policies.
Summary
LABFER is the first project that will LABFER is the first project that will comprehensively describe and evaluate fertility consequences of the unprecedented changes in the labour market, caused by digitalisation and globalisation. These changes have been taking place during the last three decades and intensified after the Great Recession. They are reflected in: rising demand for skills, massive worker displacement, spread of new work arrangements, increasing work demands and growing inequalities in labour market prospects between the low-and-medium and the highly skilled. They are likely driving the post-crisis fertility decline in the most advanced nations, which is to date not understood. LABFER is thus highly relevant and timely. It has four main objectives:
1) to study the impact of the ongoing labour market change on fertility (macro-level);
2) to examine the individual-level mechanisms behind the observed macro-level fertility effects of the ongoing labour market change;
3) to investigate the role of the growing inequalities between the low-and-medium and the highly skilled for the relative fertility patterns of the two groups;
4) to study the role of family and employment policies in moderating the fertility effects of the labour market change.
Our methodological approach is innovative. We will link data at several layers of observation (country, region, industry, firm, couple and individual) to account for the policy, work and family context of childbearing. We will also use novel labour market measures to capture the ongoing labour market change. Mixture cure models will be employed to separate the effects of covariates on birth timing and probability that the birth occurs.
LABFER will break the ground by providing understanding of how the dynamic labour market changes are associated with and potentially affect the current and future fertility dynamics and its socio-economic gradients. It will also have implications for family and employment policies.
Max ERC Funding
1 998 100 €
Duration
Start date: 2020-10-01, End date: 2025-09-30
Project acronym LIPA
Project A unified theory of finite-state recognisability
Researcher (PI) Mikolaj Konstanty Bojanczyk
Host Institution (HI) UNIWERSYTET WARSZAWSKI
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE6, ERC-2015-CoG
Summary Finite-state devices like finite automata and monoids on finite words, or extensions to trees and infinite objects, are fundamental tools of logic in computer science. There are tens of models in the literature, ranging from finite automata on finite words to weighted automata on infinite trees. Many existing finite-state models share important similarities, like existence of canonical (minimal) devices, or decidability of emptiness, or a logic-automata connection. The first and primary goal of this project is to systematically investigate these similarities, and create a unified theory of finite-state devices, which:
1. covers the whole spectrum of existing finite-state devices, including settings with diverse inputs (e.g. words and trees, or infinite inputs, or infinite alphabets) and diverse outputs (e.g. Boolean like in the classical automata, or numbers like in weighted automata); and
2. sheds light on the correct notion of finite-state device in settings where there is no universally accepted choice or where finite-state devices have not been considered at all.
The theory of finite-state devices is one of those fields of theory where even the more advanced results have natural potential for applications. It is surprising and sad how little of this potential is normally realised, with most existing software using only the most rudimentary theoretical techniques. The second goal of the project is to create two tools which use more advanced aspects of the theory of automata to solve simple problems of wide applicability (i.e. at least tens of thousands of users):
1. a system that automatically grades exercises in automata, which goes beyond simple testing, and forces the students to write proofs
2. a system that uses learning to synthesise text transformations (such a search-and-replace, but also more powerful ones) by using examples
Summary
Finite-state devices like finite automata and monoids on finite words, or extensions to trees and infinite objects, are fundamental tools of logic in computer science. There are tens of models in the literature, ranging from finite automata on finite words to weighted automata on infinite trees. Many existing finite-state models share important similarities, like existence of canonical (minimal) devices, or decidability of emptiness, or a logic-automata connection. The first and primary goal of this project is to systematically investigate these similarities, and create a unified theory of finite-state devices, which:
1. covers the whole spectrum of existing finite-state devices, including settings with diverse inputs (e.g. words and trees, or infinite inputs, or infinite alphabets) and diverse outputs (e.g. Boolean like in the classical automata, or numbers like in weighted automata); and
2. sheds light on the correct notion of finite-state device in settings where there is no universally accepted choice or where finite-state devices have not been considered at all.
The theory of finite-state devices is one of those fields of theory where even the more advanced results have natural potential for applications. It is surprising and sad how little of this potential is normally realised, with most existing software using only the most rudimentary theoretical techniques. The second goal of the project is to create two tools which use more advanced aspects of the theory of automata to solve simple problems of wide applicability (i.e. at least tens of thousands of users):
1. a system that automatically grades exercises in automata, which goes beyond simple testing, and forces the students to write proofs
2. a system that uses learning to synthesise text transformations (such a search-and-replace, but also more powerful ones) by using examples
Max ERC Funding
1 768 125 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-05-01, End date: 2021-10-31
Project acronym NAMO
Project Narrative Modes of Historical Discourse in Asia
Researcher (PI) Ulrich Timme Kragh
Host Institution (HI) UNIWERSYTET IM. ADAMA MICKIEWICZA W POZNANIU
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH5, ERC-2013-CoG
Summary Modern historiography produced in Asia belongs to the history-paradigm of the European humanities and it is from within these epistemological confines that Western as well as Eastern scholars of Asian studies view the Asian writing of the past. While source criticism and historicism have today become key parts of historical consciousness in Asia, Asian historical representations are nonetheless firmly embedded in pre-modern Asian literary traditions via specific uses in historical writing of traditional rhetorical structures of narrative, emplotment, tropes, and literary imagery.
Taking such linkage between present and past Asian traditions of historiography as its premise, project NAMO – with four team members consisting of the PI and three Postdocs – will examine the literary features of Asian historiography in India, China, and Tibet across the longue durée of the classical, medieval, and modern periods. First, a new method for the study of the literary forms that characterize historiography in Asia will be established by adapting basic analytical principles from Asian literary theories drawn from twelve classical Indian and Chinese works on poetics. Next, the team will determine the specific literary characteristics of narrative, plot, tropes, and historical explanation found in seventeen classical and medieval histories composed in China, India, and Tibet. Finally, it will be examined to which extent those traditional literary features still function as constitutive rhetorical elements in modern Asian history writing. This will be done by analyzing the literary forms used in a selection of twenty representative histories written in the People's Republic of China and the Republic of India during the period 1980-2010.
The outcome will be a novel approach for the empirical study of Asian history that will open up a new level of comparative work in the theory of history across non-Western and Western traditions.
Summary
Modern historiography produced in Asia belongs to the history-paradigm of the European humanities and it is from within these epistemological confines that Western as well as Eastern scholars of Asian studies view the Asian writing of the past. While source criticism and historicism have today become key parts of historical consciousness in Asia, Asian historical representations are nonetheless firmly embedded in pre-modern Asian literary traditions via specific uses in historical writing of traditional rhetorical structures of narrative, emplotment, tropes, and literary imagery.
Taking such linkage between present and past Asian traditions of historiography as its premise, project NAMO – with four team members consisting of the PI and three Postdocs – will examine the literary features of Asian historiography in India, China, and Tibet across the longue durée of the classical, medieval, and modern periods. First, a new method for the study of the literary forms that characterize historiography in Asia will be established by adapting basic analytical principles from Asian literary theories drawn from twelve classical Indian and Chinese works on poetics. Next, the team will determine the specific literary characteristics of narrative, plot, tropes, and historical explanation found in seventeen classical and medieval histories composed in China, India, and Tibet. Finally, it will be examined to which extent those traditional literary features still function as constitutive rhetorical elements in modern Asian history writing. This will be done by analyzing the literary forms used in a selection of twenty representative histories written in the People's Republic of China and the Republic of India during the period 1980-2010.
The outcome will be a novel approach for the empirical study of Asian history that will open up a new level of comparative work in the theory of history across non-Western and Western traditions.
Max ERC Funding
1 995 162 €
Duration
Start date: 2014-12-01, End date: 2019-11-30
Project acronym OurMythicalChildhood
Project Our Mythical Childhood... The Reception of Classical Antiquity in Children’s and Young Adults’ Culture in Response to Regional and Global Challenges
Researcher (PI) Katarzyna Marciniak
Host Institution (HI) UNIWERSYTET WARSZAWSKI
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH5, ERC-2015-CoG
Summary The project aims at developing a pioneering approach to the reception of Classical Antiquity in children’s and young adults’ contemporary culture. This newly identified research field offers valuable insights into the processes leading to the formation of the culture recipients’ identities along with their initiation into adulthood. However, the most vital potential of this phenomenon remains unexploited, for the research is still selective, focused mainly on Western culture. With my project, I intend to overcome these limitations by applying regional perspectives without the pejorative implication of regional as parochial or inferior. I recognize regions as extremely valuable contexts of the reception of Antiquity, which is not only passively taken in, but also actively reshaped in children’s and young adults’ culture in response to regional and global challenges. Thus, the essence of this innovative approach consists in comparative studies of differing reception models not only across Europe but also America, Australia & New Zealand and – a bold but necessary step – in parts of the world not commonly associated with Graeco-Roman tradition: Africa and Asia. The shared heritage of Classical Antiquity, recently enhanced by the global influence of popular culture (movies, Internet activities, computer games inspired by the classical tradition), gives a unique opportunity – through the reception filter – to gain deeper understanding of the key social, political and cultural transformations underway at various locations. The added value of this original research, carried out by an international team of scholars, will be its extremely broad impact on the frontiers of scholarship, education and culture: we will elaborate a supra-regional survey of classical references, publish a number of analyses of crucial reception cases, and prepare materials on how to use ancient myths in work with disabled children, thus contributing to integration and stimulating cultural exchange.
Summary
The project aims at developing a pioneering approach to the reception of Classical Antiquity in children’s and young adults’ contemporary culture. This newly identified research field offers valuable insights into the processes leading to the formation of the culture recipients’ identities along with their initiation into adulthood. However, the most vital potential of this phenomenon remains unexploited, for the research is still selective, focused mainly on Western culture. With my project, I intend to overcome these limitations by applying regional perspectives without the pejorative implication of regional as parochial or inferior. I recognize regions as extremely valuable contexts of the reception of Antiquity, which is not only passively taken in, but also actively reshaped in children’s and young adults’ culture in response to regional and global challenges. Thus, the essence of this innovative approach consists in comparative studies of differing reception models not only across Europe but also America, Australia & New Zealand and – a bold but necessary step – in parts of the world not commonly associated with Graeco-Roman tradition: Africa and Asia. The shared heritage of Classical Antiquity, recently enhanced by the global influence of popular culture (movies, Internet activities, computer games inspired by the classical tradition), gives a unique opportunity – through the reception filter – to gain deeper understanding of the key social, political and cultural transformations underway at various locations. The added value of this original research, carried out by an international team of scholars, will be its extremely broad impact on the frontiers of scholarship, education and culture: we will elaborate a supra-regional survey of classical references, publish a number of analyses of crucial reception cases, and prepare materials on how to use ancient myths in work with disabled children, thus contributing to integration and stimulating cultural exchange.
Max ERC Funding
1 489 200 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-10-01, End date: 2021-09-30
Project acronym PRAGMA
Project Pragmatics of Multiwinner Voting: Algorithms and Preference Data Analysis
Researcher (PI) Piotr FALISZEWSKI
Host Institution (HI) AKADEMIA GORNICZO-HUTNICZA IM. STANISLAWA STASZICA W KRAKOWIE
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE6, ERC-2020-COG
Summary This proposal is in the area of computational social choice, an area on the intersection of computer science and economics. We study multiwinner elections, with a focus on a pragmatic approach. Our goal is to provide a principled framework for applying multiwinner voting in various settings that may appear in real-life (ranging from small-scale elections in various institutions, through participatory budgeting settings, to applications directly within computer science). In particular, we are interested in: (a) designing new, fast algorithms for computing the outcomes of multiwinner voting rules (results of such rules are often NP-hard to compute), also for new languages of specifying preferences that are needed in practical settings; (b) obtaining algorithmic and mathematical understanding of preference data; and (c) providing algorithms for analyzing elections and their results. We are interested both in theoretical studies (designing new algorithms, analyzing computational complexity of election-related problems, establishing axiomatic features of multiwinner voting rules, etc.) and in experimental evaluations (finding out running times of algorithms, establishing their approximation ratios, evaluating properties of preference data, etc.).
Summary
This proposal is in the area of computational social choice, an area on the intersection of computer science and economics. We study multiwinner elections, with a focus on a pragmatic approach. Our goal is to provide a principled framework for applying multiwinner voting in various settings that may appear in real-life (ranging from small-scale elections in various institutions, through participatory budgeting settings, to applications directly within computer science). In particular, we are interested in: (a) designing new, fast algorithms for computing the outcomes of multiwinner voting rules (results of such rules are often NP-hard to compute), also for new languages of specifying preferences that are needed in practical settings; (b) obtaining algorithmic and mathematical understanding of preference data; and (c) providing algorithms for analyzing elections and their results. We are interested both in theoretical studies (designing new algorithms, analyzing computational complexity of election-related problems, establishing axiomatic features of multiwinner voting rules, etc.) and in experimental evaluations (finding out running times of algorithms, establishing their approximation ratios, evaluating properties of preference data, etc.).
Max ERC Funding
1 386 290 €
Duration
Start date: 2021-06-01, End date: 2026-05-31
Project acronym TUgbOAT
Project Towards Unification of Algorithmic Tools
Researcher (PI) Piotr SANKOWSKI
Host Institution (HI) UNIWERSYTET WARSZAWSKI
Country Poland
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), PE6, ERC-2017-COG
Summary Over last 50 years, extensive algorithmic research gave rise to a plethora of fundamental results. These results equipped us with increasingly better solutions to a number of core problems. However, many of these solutions are incomparable. The main reason for that is the fact that many cutting-edge algorithmic results are very specialized in their applicability. Often, they are limited to particular parameter range or require different assumptions.
A natural question arises: is it possible to get “one to rule them all” algorithm for some core problems such as matchings and maximum flow? In other words, can we unify our algorithms? That is, can we develop an algorithmic framework that enables us to combine a number of existing, only “conditionally” optimal, algorithms into a single all-around optimal solution? Such results would unify the landscape of algorithmic theory but would also greatly enhance the impact of these cutting-edge developments on the real world. After all, algorithms and data structures are the basic building blocks of every computer program. However, currently using cutting-edge algorithms in an optimal way requires extensive expertise and thorough understanding of both the underlying implementation and the characteristics of the input data.
Hence, the need for such unified solutions seems to be critical from both theoretical and practical perspective. However, obtaining such algorithmic unification poses serious theoretical challenges. We believe that some of the recent advances in algorithms provide us with an opportunity to make serious progress towards solving these challenges in the context of several fundamental algorithmic problems. This project should be seen as the start of such a systematic study of unification of algorithmic tools with the aim to remove the need to “under the hood” while still guaranteeing an optimal performance independently of the particular usage case.
Summary
Over last 50 years, extensive algorithmic research gave rise to a plethora of fundamental results. These results equipped us with increasingly better solutions to a number of core problems. However, many of these solutions are incomparable. The main reason for that is the fact that many cutting-edge algorithmic results are very specialized in their applicability. Often, they are limited to particular parameter range or require different assumptions.
A natural question arises: is it possible to get “one to rule them all” algorithm for some core problems such as matchings and maximum flow? In other words, can we unify our algorithms? That is, can we develop an algorithmic framework that enables us to combine a number of existing, only “conditionally” optimal, algorithms into a single all-around optimal solution? Such results would unify the landscape of algorithmic theory but would also greatly enhance the impact of these cutting-edge developments on the real world. After all, algorithms and data structures are the basic building blocks of every computer program. However, currently using cutting-edge algorithms in an optimal way requires extensive expertise and thorough understanding of both the underlying implementation and the characteristics of the input data.
Hence, the need for such unified solutions seems to be critical from both theoretical and practical perspective. However, obtaining such algorithmic unification poses serious theoretical challenges. We believe that some of the recent advances in algorithms provide us with an opportunity to make serious progress towards solving these challenges in the context of several fundamental algorithmic problems. This project should be seen as the start of such a systematic study of unification of algorithmic tools with the aim to remove the need to “under the hood” while still guaranteeing an optimal performance independently of the particular usage case.
Max ERC Funding
1 510 800 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-09-01, End date: 2023-08-31
