Project acronym 9 SALT
Project Reassessing Ninth Century Philosophy. A Synchronic Approach to the Logical Traditions
Researcher (PI) Christophe Florian Erismann
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT WIEN
Country Austria
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH5, ERC-2014-CoG
Summary This project aims at a better understanding of the philosophical richness of ninth century thought using the unprecedented and highly innovative method of the synchronic approach. The hypothesis directing this synchronic approach is that studying together in parallel the four main philosophical traditions of the century – i.e. Latin, Greek, Syriac and Arabic – will bring results that the traditional enquiry limited to one tradition alone can never reach. This implies pioneering a new methodology to overcome the compartmentalization of research which prevails nowadays. Using this method is only possible because the four conditions of applicability – comparable intellectual environment, common text corpus, similar methodological perspective, commensurable problems – are fulfilled. The ninth century, a time of cultural renewal in the Carolingian, Byzantine and Abbasid empires, possesses the remarkable characteristic – which ensures commensurability – that the same texts, namely the writings of Aristotelian logic (mainly Porphyry’s Isagoge and Aristotle’s Categories) were read and commented upon in Latin, Greek, Syriac and Arabic alike.
Logic is fundamental to philosophical enquiry. The contested question is the human capacity to rationalise, analyse and describe the sensible reality, to understand the ontological structure of the world, and to define the types of entities which exist. The use of this unprecedented synchronic approach will allow us a deeper understanding of the positions, a clear identification of the a priori postulates of the philosophical debates, and a critical evaluation of the arguments used. It provides a unique opportunity to compare the different traditions and highlight the heritage which is common, to stress the specificities of each tradition when tackling philosophical issues and to discover the doctrinal results triggered by their mutual interactions, be they constructive (scholarly exchanges) or polemic (religious controversies).
Summary
This project aims at a better understanding of the philosophical richness of ninth century thought using the unprecedented and highly innovative method of the synchronic approach. The hypothesis directing this synchronic approach is that studying together in parallel the four main philosophical traditions of the century – i.e. Latin, Greek, Syriac and Arabic – will bring results that the traditional enquiry limited to one tradition alone can never reach. This implies pioneering a new methodology to overcome the compartmentalization of research which prevails nowadays. Using this method is only possible because the four conditions of applicability – comparable intellectual environment, common text corpus, similar methodological perspective, commensurable problems – are fulfilled. The ninth century, a time of cultural renewal in the Carolingian, Byzantine and Abbasid empires, possesses the remarkable characteristic – which ensures commensurability – that the same texts, namely the writings of Aristotelian logic (mainly Porphyry’s Isagoge and Aristotle’s Categories) were read and commented upon in Latin, Greek, Syriac and Arabic alike.
Logic is fundamental to philosophical enquiry. The contested question is the human capacity to rationalise, analyse and describe the sensible reality, to understand the ontological structure of the world, and to define the types of entities which exist. The use of this unprecedented synchronic approach will allow us a deeper understanding of the positions, a clear identification of the a priori postulates of the philosophical debates, and a critical evaluation of the arguments used. It provides a unique opportunity to compare the different traditions and highlight the heritage which is common, to stress the specificities of each tradition when tackling philosophical issues and to discover the doctrinal results triggered by their mutual interactions, be they constructive (scholarly exchanges) or polemic (religious controversies).
Max ERC Funding
1 998 566 €
Duration
Start date: 2015-09-01, End date: 2021-02-28
Project acronym AMBH
Project Ancient Music Beyond Hellenisation
Researcher (PI) Stefan HAGEL
Host Institution (HI) OESTERREICHISCHE AKADEMIE DER WISSENSCHAFTEN
Country Austria
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH5, ERC-2017-ADG
Summary From medieval times, Arabic as well as European music was analysed in terms that were inherited from Classical Antiquity and had thus developed in a very different music culture. In spite of recent breakthroughs in the understanding of the latter, whose technicalities we access not only through texts and iconography, but also through instrument finds and surviving notated melodies, its relation to music traditions known from later periods and different places is almost uncharted territory.
The present project explores relations between Hellenic/Hellenistic music as pervaded the theatres and concert halls throughout and beyond the Roman empire, Near Eastern traditions – from the diatonic system emerging from cuneiform sources to the flourishing musical world of the caliphates – and, as far as possible, African musical life south of Egypt as well – a region that maintained close ties both with the Hellenised culture of its northern neighbours and with the Arabian Peninsula.
On the one hand, this demands collaboration between Classical Philology and Arabic Studies, extending methods recently developed within music archaeological research related to the Classical Mediterranean. Arabic writings need to be examined in close reading, using recent insights into the interplay between ancient music theory and practice, in order to segregate the influence of Greek thinking from ideas and facts that must relate to contemporaneous ‘Arabic’ music-making. In this way we hope better to define the relation of this tradition to the ‘Classical world’, potentially breaking free of Orientalising bias informing modern views. On the other hand, the study and reconstruction, virtual and material, of wind instruments of Hellenistic pedigree but found outside the confinements of the Hellenistic ‘heartlands’ may provide evidence of ‘foreign’ tonality employed in those regions – specifically the royal city of Meroë in modern Sudan and the Oxus Temple in modern Tajikistan.
Summary
From medieval times, Arabic as well as European music was analysed in terms that were inherited from Classical Antiquity and had thus developed in a very different music culture. In spite of recent breakthroughs in the understanding of the latter, whose technicalities we access not only through texts and iconography, but also through instrument finds and surviving notated melodies, its relation to music traditions known from later periods and different places is almost uncharted territory.
The present project explores relations between Hellenic/Hellenistic music as pervaded the theatres and concert halls throughout and beyond the Roman empire, Near Eastern traditions – from the diatonic system emerging from cuneiform sources to the flourishing musical world of the caliphates – and, as far as possible, African musical life south of Egypt as well – a region that maintained close ties both with the Hellenised culture of its northern neighbours and with the Arabian Peninsula.
On the one hand, this demands collaboration between Classical Philology and Arabic Studies, extending methods recently developed within music archaeological research related to the Classical Mediterranean. Arabic writings need to be examined in close reading, using recent insights into the interplay between ancient music theory and practice, in order to segregate the influence of Greek thinking from ideas and facts that must relate to contemporaneous ‘Arabic’ music-making. In this way we hope better to define the relation of this tradition to the ‘Classical world’, potentially breaking free of Orientalising bias informing modern views. On the other hand, the study and reconstruction, virtual and material, of wind instruments of Hellenistic pedigree but found outside the confinements of the Hellenistic ‘heartlands’ may provide evidence of ‘foreign’ tonality employed in those regions – specifically the royal city of Meroë in modern Sudan and the Oxus Temple in modern Tajikistan.
Max ERC Funding
775 959 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-09-01, End date: 2023-08-31
Project acronym GMM
Project Globalized Memorial Museums.Exhibiting Atrocities in the Era of Claims for Moral Universals
Researcher (PI) Ljiljana Radonic
Host Institution (HI) OESTERREICHISCHE AKADEMIE DER WISSENSCHAFTEN
Country Austria
Call Details Consolidator Grant (CoG), SH5, ERC-2018-COG
Summary The ‘universalization of the Holocaust’ has established the Shoah as an historical reference point legitimizing a global moral imperative to respect human rights. Much has been written about the ostensible ‘globalization of memory’, but as yet no genuinely global comparative study systematically confronting this hypothesis with the actual representations of atrocities exists. GMM breaks new ground by examining memorial museums on four continents, arguing that what is called ‘globalization’ in fact comprises three to some degree contradictory trends:
1) The US Holocaust Memorial Museum and Yad Vashem are role models for a universal moral orientation that focuses on the individual victim and generates aesthetic ‘standards’ for musealization.
2) The German concept of negative memory, self-critically confronting the crimes committed by her own population, has inspired museums to tackle the question of one’s own complicity in order to challenge collective self-victimization and the externalization of responsibility.
3) The genocides of the 1990s led to a ‘forensic turn’: the investigation of bones & other material evidence of atrocities has changed the way in situ memorial museums deal with material traces of violence. This shift has also impacted ‘old’ memorial sites like Sobibor, which has become a site of archaeological research after 70 years.
GMM examines 50 memorial museums dealing with
- the WWII period in the US, Israel, Europe, China, and Japan;
- recent genocides in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.
Scholars claim that ‘globalized’ memorial museums reflect new moral standards and a new language of commemoration, but what is the price of the attendant de-contextualization in the name of moral universals? GMM’s wholly original global typology of memorial museums has the potential to act as a genuine game changer that challenges the concept of ‘universal memory’ and the notion that memorial museums constitute a globalized space of communication and negotiation.
Summary
The ‘universalization of the Holocaust’ has established the Shoah as an historical reference point legitimizing a global moral imperative to respect human rights. Much has been written about the ostensible ‘globalization of memory’, but as yet no genuinely global comparative study systematically confronting this hypothesis with the actual representations of atrocities exists. GMM breaks new ground by examining memorial museums on four continents, arguing that what is called ‘globalization’ in fact comprises three to some degree contradictory trends:
1) The US Holocaust Memorial Museum and Yad Vashem are role models for a universal moral orientation that focuses on the individual victim and generates aesthetic ‘standards’ for musealization.
2) The German concept of negative memory, self-critically confronting the crimes committed by her own population, has inspired museums to tackle the question of one’s own complicity in order to challenge collective self-victimization and the externalization of responsibility.
3) The genocides of the 1990s led to a ‘forensic turn’: the investigation of bones & other material evidence of atrocities has changed the way in situ memorial museums deal with material traces of violence. This shift has also impacted ‘old’ memorial sites like Sobibor, which has become a site of archaeological research after 70 years.
GMM examines 50 memorial museums dealing with
- the WWII period in the US, Israel, Europe, China, and Japan;
- recent genocides in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia.
Scholars claim that ‘globalized’ memorial museums reflect new moral standards and a new language of commemoration, but what is the price of the attendant de-contextualization in the name of moral universals? GMM’s wholly original global typology of memorial museums has the potential to act as a genuine game changer that challenges the concept of ‘universal memory’ and the notion that memorial museums constitute a globalized space of communication and negotiation.
Max ERC Funding
1 947 514 €
Duration
Start date: 2019-09-01, End date: 2024-08-31
Project acronym Group Agency
Project The Normative and Moral Foundations of Group Agency
Researcher (PI) Herlinde Pauer-Studer
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT WIEN
Country Austria
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH5, ERC-2016-ADG
Summary Though philosophers have debated intensely the issue of group agency in the last years, little scholarly work has yet been done on the normative constitution of group agents. The present project will fill this lacuna in a groundbreaking way. A philosophical analysis of the constitutive conditions of individual and collective agency will be combined with recent research in moral philosophy, legal theory and economic theory on the organisational structure of institutional agency. The first aim of the project is to provide a detailed philosophical investigation of the normative foundations of group agency and to work out the rational and moral norms that constitute and guide group agents. The second aim is to explore the implications of such an analysis for moral and legal philosophy. The third aim of the project is to apply the philosophical results to a normative analysis of corporate and economic agents.
The main objectives of this project are:
(1) To analyse the constitutive and regulative rules of group agency and their impact on the normative identity and self-understanding of associative as well as institutional group agents.
(2) To investigate the consequences of philosophical work on group agency for recent theorising in moral and legal philosophy.
(3) To explore how the achieved philosophical results can help advance a normative understanding of group agents with a clear organisational structure such as corporate and economic agents.
The results will give us a new understanding of group agency, but will also have an impact on debates about the concept of agency in moral philosophy, legal philosophy, and philosophy of economics. Methodologically, the project will cover philosophy of action, moral philosophy, legal theory, philosophy of economics, and organisation theory.
The project will also have an impact on wider debates about normative orders in general and the normative framework and structure of social, political and economic institutions.
Summary
Though philosophers have debated intensely the issue of group agency in the last years, little scholarly work has yet been done on the normative constitution of group agents. The present project will fill this lacuna in a groundbreaking way. A philosophical analysis of the constitutive conditions of individual and collective agency will be combined with recent research in moral philosophy, legal theory and economic theory on the organisational structure of institutional agency. The first aim of the project is to provide a detailed philosophical investigation of the normative foundations of group agency and to work out the rational and moral norms that constitute and guide group agents. The second aim is to explore the implications of such an analysis for moral and legal philosophy. The third aim of the project is to apply the philosophical results to a normative analysis of corporate and economic agents.
The main objectives of this project are:
(1) To analyse the constitutive and regulative rules of group agency and their impact on the normative identity and self-understanding of associative as well as institutional group agents.
(2) To investigate the consequences of philosophical work on group agency for recent theorising in moral and legal philosophy.
(3) To explore how the achieved philosophical results can help advance a normative understanding of group agents with a clear organisational structure such as corporate and economic agents.
The results will give us a new understanding of group agency, but will also have an impact on debates about the concept of agency in moral philosophy, legal philosophy, and philosophy of economics. Methodologically, the project will cover philosophy of action, moral philosophy, legal theory, philosophy of economics, and organisation theory.
The project will also have an impact on wider debates about normative orders in general and the normative framework and structure of social, political and economic institutions.
Max ERC Funding
2 495 191 €
Duration
Start date: 2017-12-01, End date: 2022-11-30
Project acronym HUNAYNNET
Project Transmission of Classical Scientific and Philosophical Literature from Greek into Syriac and Arabic
Researcher (PI) Grigory Kessel
Host Institution (HI) OESTERREICHISCHE AKADEMIE DER WISSENSCHAFTEN
Country Austria
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH5, ERC-2015-STG
Summary It is often taken for granted that the Greek-Arabic translation movement (8th-10th c.) that made the whole bulk of Classical Greek scientific and philosophical literature available in Arabic (and that was later handed over to Europe in Latin translations) owes much to the preceding period in the history of transmission of this scientific and philosophical literature, namely translations into the Syriac language that were implemented by Aramaic-speaking Syriac Christians. The problem of continuity between the two periods however has not been tackled thoroughly in scholarship and thus the actual impact of the Syriac translations on later methods of translation has so far not been measured and assessed. One feasible solution to this problem in our understanding of the background to the Greek-Arabic translation movement is to implement a comprehensive comparison of Syriac and Arabic translations by means of lexicographical analysis. This project offers a research tool capable of allowing this comparison. It will combine methods of online lexicography and of corpus linguistics with the aim of presenting in a systematic and rationalized way the lexical data from the entire corpus of Syriac scientific and philosophical translations, comparing and analyzing its terminology and translation techniques, first, with the extant Greek originals and, secondly, with Arabic versions. The lexicographic database will be an effective instrument providing definite data for the study of Syriac and Arabic translations and their close connections. It will reveal how the Syriac translations along with underlying methods and tools that were put to use for the first time ever by Syriac Christians eventually determined the prosperity of the Islamic sciences. Fully endorsing a principle of open access the database creates a new instrument for a study of the history of the transmission of Greek scientific literature in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.
Summary
It is often taken for granted that the Greek-Arabic translation movement (8th-10th c.) that made the whole bulk of Classical Greek scientific and philosophical literature available in Arabic (and that was later handed over to Europe in Latin translations) owes much to the preceding period in the history of transmission of this scientific and philosophical literature, namely translations into the Syriac language that were implemented by Aramaic-speaking Syriac Christians. The problem of continuity between the two periods however has not been tackled thoroughly in scholarship and thus the actual impact of the Syriac translations on later methods of translation has so far not been measured and assessed. One feasible solution to this problem in our understanding of the background to the Greek-Arabic translation movement is to implement a comprehensive comparison of Syriac and Arabic translations by means of lexicographical analysis. This project offers a research tool capable of allowing this comparison. It will combine methods of online lexicography and of corpus linguistics with the aim of presenting in a systematic and rationalized way the lexical data from the entire corpus of Syriac scientific and philosophical translations, comparing and analyzing its terminology and translation techniques, first, with the extant Greek originals and, secondly, with Arabic versions. The lexicographic database will be an effective instrument providing definite data for the study of Syriac and Arabic translations and their close connections. It will reveal how the Syriac translations along with underlying methods and tools that were put to use for the first time ever by Syriac Christians eventually determined the prosperity of the Islamic sciences. Fully endorsing a principle of open access the database creates a new instrument for a study of the history of the transmission of Greek scientific literature in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.
Max ERC Funding
1 498 452 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-05-01, End date: 2021-04-30
Project acronym NOSCEMUS
Project Nova Scientia. Early Modern Scientific Literature and Latin
Researcher (PI) Martin KORENJAK
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAET INNSBRUCK
Country Austria
Call Details Advanced Grant (AdG), SH5, ERC-2016-ADG
Summary Fundamental changes occurred in the study of nature between the late 15th and 18th centuries, leading to the emergence of modern science as we know it. This process would have been impossible without Latin as the scientific lingua franca of the era, just as today's science is hard to imagine without English. At present, this crucial role of Latin is insufficiently acknowledged, and the hundreds of thousands of scientific texts written in Latin have largely remained neglected. This severely limits the scope of research into the history of early modern science, an otherwise thriving field.
The proposed project intends to decisively advance our understanding of the interrelation of Latin and science in early modern times. By applying the methods of Latin philology, yet at the same time reaching out to historians of science, it will establish early modern scientific literature in Latin as an interdisciplinary research field. This will be accomplished
(a) by examining and classifying the formal variety and range of content of this literature to create an overall picture
(b) by analysing its function as a medium of communication within and beyond the scientific community.
To realise the first of these objectives, a tripartite database for authors, early modern texts, and secondary literature will be compiled and a sourcebook with a selection of digitally searchable texts put together, both of which will be made available online. A monograph will provide an overview structured according to the literary genres of early modern scientific literature in Latin. The second objective will be achieved through a series of interlinked monographs, whose analyses will build on the system of ancient rhetoric, the most important communicative paradigm of the early modern age. On this basis, four key functions of Latin scientific texts will be assessed: naming new phenomena; describing and explaining them; convincing others of the views expressed; and promoting science.
Summary
Fundamental changes occurred in the study of nature between the late 15th and 18th centuries, leading to the emergence of modern science as we know it. This process would have been impossible without Latin as the scientific lingua franca of the era, just as today's science is hard to imagine without English. At present, this crucial role of Latin is insufficiently acknowledged, and the hundreds of thousands of scientific texts written in Latin have largely remained neglected. This severely limits the scope of research into the history of early modern science, an otherwise thriving field.
The proposed project intends to decisively advance our understanding of the interrelation of Latin and science in early modern times. By applying the methods of Latin philology, yet at the same time reaching out to historians of science, it will establish early modern scientific literature in Latin as an interdisciplinary research field. This will be accomplished
(a) by examining and classifying the formal variety and range of content of this literature to create an overall picture
(b) by analysing its function as a medium of communication within and beyond the scientific community.
To realise the first of these objectives, a tripartite database for authors, early modern texts, and secondary literature will be compiled and a sourcebook with a selection of digitally searchable texts put together, both of which will be made available online. A monograph will provide an overview structured according to the literary genres of early modern scientific literature in Latin. The second objective will be achieved through a series of interlinked monographs, whose analyses will build on the system of ancient rhetoric, the most important communicative paradigm of the early modern age. On this basis, four key functions of Latin scientific texts will be assessed: naming new phenomena; describing and explaining them; convincing others of the views expressed; and promoting science.
Max ERC Funding
2 421 224 €
Duration
Start date: 2017-10-01, End date: 2022-09-30
Project acronym POSEC
Project Postsecular Conflicts and the role of Russian Orthodoxy in the transnational alliances of moral conservative traditionalists
Researcher (PI) Kristina Stoeckl
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAET INNSBRUCK
Country Austria
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH5, ERC-2015-STG
Summary The POSEC project proposes the study of a hitherto under-researched phenomenon in the field of religion and politics: the rise of traditionalists, i.e. religious actors who rely on the conservative religious and political establishment in their respective home-countries, co-opt political and civil society actors, and forge transnational alliances, thereby inaugurating a new kind of religious politics which has not yet been studied and theorized in depth. The project will explore the agenda and transnational networks of traditionalist moral conservative actors from the perspective of the Russian Orthodox Church and its connections with the Russian political establishment on the grounds that it is necessary to understand the role and the resources of Russian politics and Orthodox religion in order to assess correctly the scope of this “moralist international” and the challenge it poses to liberal democracy. The research will analyse traditionalist actors and their ideas with regard to the three main areas where religious-moral conflicts emerge – religious symbols & free speech, sexuality & gender, and bioethics & biotechnology – and across four international institutional settings – the United Nations Human Rights Council, the Council of Europe, the European Court of Human Rights, and forums of inter-religious dialogue like the World Council of Churches. Adopting a contextualized political theory approach, the project will develop on the basis of the empirical and theoretical insights drawn from this case-study a reflexive political pluralist model of moral conflicts. This model offers an innovative extension to political liberalism inasmuch as it assesses within the political liberal framework the new reality of majoritarian, transnational traditionalist politics.
Summary
The POSEC project proposes the study of a hitherto under-researched phenomenon in the field of religion and politics: the rise of traditionalists, i.e. religious actors who rely on the conservative religious and political establishment in their respective home-countries, co-opt political and civil society actors, and forge transnational alliances, thereby inaugurating a new kind of religious politics which has not yet been studied and theorized in depth. The project will explore the agenda and transnational networks of traditionalist moral conservative actors from the perspective of the Russian Orthodox Church and its connections with the Russian political establishment on the grounds that it is necessary to understand the role and the resources of Russian politics and Orthodox religion in order to assess correctly the scope of this “moralist international” and the challenge it poses to liberal democracy. The research will analyse traditionalist actors and their ideas with regard to the three main areas where religious-moral conflicts emerge – religious symbols & free speech, sexuality & gender, and bioethics & biotechnology – and across four international institutional settings – the United Nations Human Rights Council, the Council of Europe, the European Court of Human Rights, and forums of inter-religious dialogue like the World Council of Churches. Adopting a contextualized political theory approach, the project will develop on the basis of the empirical and theoretical insights drawn from this case-study a reflexive political pluralist model of moral conflicts. This model offers an innovative extension to political liberalism inasmuch as it assesses within the political liberal framework the new reality of majoritarian, transnational traditionalist politics.
Max ERC Funding
1 499 260 €
Duration
Start date: 2016-05-01, End date: 2022-04-30
Project acronym PRODUCTION OF WORK
Project The production of work. Welfare, labour-market and the disputed boundaries of labour (1880-1938)
Researcher (PI) Sigrid Wadauer
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT WIEN
Country Austria
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH5, ERC-2007-StG
Summary Since the late 19th century modern social welfare policy has established social insurances in certain formalized cases of non-work: in case of old age, illness, invalidity, and unemployment. Doing so, it gained importance to control the entitlement to social welfare, national affiliation, willingness or (in-)ability to work. These new regulations of work and non-work also manifested new concepts of work and vocation. Simultaneously and with reference to the new social status of labour and to the new social rights debates on vagrancy, begging and the work-shy relived a new boom. Who should receive help? Who is a threat to the greater public good by refusing labour? Not every way to find income was equally acknowledged as work. There was a variety of activities changeable between work, hunting for a job, non-work, begging and vagrancy. These activities were suspected of being a cover of work-shyness and negative work. Through that they belonged to a disputed sphere at the margins of welfare, labour market and criminality. Within this context unskilled, occasional, seasonal labour were further marginalized and subject of re-definition. The project analyses these disputed boundaries of work. It will focus on Austria 1918-1938, but it aims at an international comparison and will consider relevant developments since the late 19th century, too. The project will study precarious forms of waged labour and non-work within the context of the organisations of labour market, search for employment and job placement. Therefore it is of fundamental importance to include marginal perspectives and practices into the analysis. How did concepts of vocational work and their binding character vary according to age, gender and ethnicity? In which ways were work and non-work defined? How were the distinctions and hierarchies practically implemented? Of particular interest is the tramping of the unemployed and forms of integration, support and control of ramblers being related to it.
Summary
Since the late 19th century modern social welfare policy has established social insurances in certain formalized cases of non-work: in case of old age, illness, invalidity, and unemployment. Doing so, it gained importance to control the entitlement to social welfare, national affiliation, willingness or (in-)ability to work. These new regulations of work and non-work also manifested new concepts of work and vocation. Simultaneously and with reference to the new social status of labour and to the new social rights debates on vagrancy, begging and the work-shy relived a new boom. Who should receive help? Who is a threat to the greater public good by refusing labour? Not every way to find income was equally acknowledged as work. There was a variety of activities changeable between work, hunting for a job, non-work, begging and vagrancy. These activities were suspected of being a cover of work-shyness and negative work. Through that they belonged to a disputed sphere at the margins of welfare, labour market and criminality. Within this context unskilled, occasional, seasonal labour were further marginalized and subject of re-definition. The project analyses these disputed boundaries of work. It will focus on Austria 1918-1938, but it aims at an international comparison and will consider relevant developments since the late 19th century, too. The project will study precarious forms of waged labour and non-work within the context of the organisations of labour market, search for employment and job placement. Therefore it is of fundamental importance to include marginal perspectives and practices into the analysis. How did concepts of vocational work and their binding character vary according to age, gender and ethnicity? In which ways were work and non-work defined? How were the distinctions and hierarchies practically implemented? Of particular interest is the tramping of the unemployed and forms of integration, support and control of ramblers being related to it.
Max ERC Funding
1 372 760 €
Duration
Start date: 2008-10-01, End date: 2013-09-30
Project acronym STRUCTURALISM
Project The Roots of Mathematical Structuralism
Researcher (PI) Georg SCHIEMER
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT WIEN
Country Austria
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH5, ERC-2016-STG
Summary Mathematical structuralism is a central position in contemporary philosophy of mathematics. It is the view that mathematical theories describe only abstract structures or structural properties of their subject fields. This project will investigate the mathematical and philosophical roots of structuralism in a ground-breaking way. The focus will be set on two historical developments in nineteenth century mathematics and early twentieth century philosophy of science: the first one concerns several conceptual changes in geometry between 1860 and 1910 that eventually led to a “structural turn” in the field. This includes the gradual implementation of model-theoretic techniques in geometrical reasoning, the study of geometrical theories by group-theoretic methods as well as the successive consolidation of formal axiomatics. The second development analyzed here concerns the beginnings of the philosophical reflection on structural mathematics between 1900 and 1940. This includes different attempts by thinkers such as Rudolf Carnap, Edmund Husserl, and Ernst Cassirer to spell out the philosophical implications of the new structuralist methodologies at work in modern geometry. The principal objective of the project is to provide the first comparative investigation of these early contributions to structuralism and their immediate mathematical background. The integrative study of the history and the philosophy of modern mathematics will not only change our conception of the evolution of the philosophy of mathematics in the twentieth century. It will also transform the ways in which we presently think about mathematics. Specifically, the project will provide new systematic insights relevant to contemporary structuralism, in particular a new understanding of notions such as mathematical structure, structure abstraction, and structural property, as well as of their significance for the philosophy of mathematical practice.
Summary
Mathematical structuralism is a central position in contemporary philosophy of mathematics. It is the view that mathematical theories describe only abstract structures or structural properties of their subject fields. This project will investigate the mathematical and philosophical roots of structuralism in a ground-breaking way. The focus will be set on two historical developments in nineteenth century mathematics and early twentieth century philosophy of science: the first one concerns several conceptual changes in geometry between 1860 and 1910 that eventually led to a “structural turn” in the field. This includes the gradual implementation of model-theoretic techniques in geometrical reasoning, the study of geometrical theories by group-theoretic methods as well as the successive consolidation of formal axiomatics. The second development analyzed here concerns the beginnings of the philosophical reflection on structural mathematics between 1900 and 1940. This includes different attempts by thinkers such as Rudolf Carnap, Edmund Husserl, and Ernst Cassirer to spell out the philosophical implications of the new structuralist methodologies at work in modern geometry. The principal objective of the project is to provide the first comparative investigation of these early contributions to structuralism and their immediate mathematical background. The integrative study of the history and the philosophy of modern mathematics will not only change our conception of the evolution of the philosophy of mathematics in the twentieth century. It will also transform the ways in which we presently think about mathematics. Specifically, the project will provide new systematic insights relevant to contemporary structuralism, in particular a new understanding of notions such as mathematical structure, structure abstraction, and structural property, as well as of their significance for the philosophy of mathematical practice.
Max ERC Funding
1 364 097 €
Duration
Start date: 2017-03-01, End date: 2022-02-28
Project acronym THEKAISERSMOSQUES
Project Islamic architecture and Orientalizing style in Habsburg Bosnia, 1878-1918
Researcher (PI) Maximilian HARTMUTH
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAT WIEN
Country Austria
Call Details Starting Grant (StG), SH5, ERC-2017-STG
Summary The project highlights a grossly understudied experiment at the intersection of nineteenth-century European and Islamic architectural histories. It draws attention to a significant body of buildings designed by architects trained in Central Europe for use by Muslims in Habsburg-ruled Bosnia-Herzegovina (1878-1918). These buildings, many of which mosques, largely draw upon a traditional Islamic formal and functional typology. The composition and decoration of their facades, however, is the product of nineteenth-century Historicist conduct. Quoted are elements from assorted Islamic artistic heritages, with prominence given to Cairo and Andalusia. In Bosnia, many of these buildings were misinterpreted as mere renovations of Ottoman edifices, as is indeed declared on several inscriptions. However, this information generally appears to pertain to the institutions accommodated in these buildings rather than to their present form and architecture.
The project’s primary intention is to validate the assertion that these buildings must be considered a distinct group of architectural monuments, and that they, in consequence, constitute a phenomenon that necessitates separate appraisal and study. Intertwined with this architectural phenomenon is the stylistic phenomenon traditionally (yet inaccurately) called ‘pseudo-Moorish’ in Bosnia. This Orientalizing style was the preferred choice for buildings constructed for use by Muslims; it is be the project’s second focus of inquiry. The study seeks to explore its historical sources and the channels of their reception, as well as the logic and aesthetic of these sources’ paraphrasing in a nineteenth-century context.
By documenting and analyzing this heritage in the necessary detail, the project fills a significant gap in published scholarly research. It also contributes to our understanding of European powers’ historical responses to the challenge of cultural diversity in territories under their control.
Summary
The project highlights a grossly understudied experiment at the intersection of nineteenth-century European and Islamic architectural histories. It draws attention to a significant body of buildings designed by architects trained in Central Europe for use by Muslims in Habsburg-ruled Bosnia-Herzegovina (1878-1918). These buildings, many of which mosques, largely draw upon a traditional Islamic formal and functional typology. The composition and decoration of their facades, however, is the product of nineteenth-century Historicist conduct. Quoted are elements from assorted Islamic artistic heritages, with prominence given to Cairo and Andalusia. In Bosnia, many of these buildings were misinterpreted as mere renovations of Ottoman edifices, as is indeed declared on several inscriptions. However, this information generally appears to pertain to the institutions accommodated in these buildings rather than to their present form and architecture.
The project’s primary intention is to validate the assertion that these buildings must be considered a distinct group of architectural monuments, and that they, in consequence, constitute a phenomenon that necessitates separate appraisal and study. Intertwined with this architectural phenomenon is the stylistic phenomenon traditionally (yet inaccurately) called ‘pseudo-Moorish’ in Bosnia. This Orientalizing style was the preferred choice for buildings constructed for use by Muslims; it is be the project’s second focus of inquiry. The study seeks to explore its historical sources and the channels of their reception, as well as the logic and aesthetic of these sources’ paraphrasing in a nineteenth-century context.
By documenting and analyzing this heritage in the necessary detail, the project fills a significant gap in published scholarly research. It also contributes to our understanding of European powers’ historical responses to the challenge of cultural diversity in territories under their control.
Max ERC Funding
1 257 973 €
Duration
Start date: 2018-02-01, End date: 2023-01-31
