With support of the Ministry of the Interior, the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg has compiled an online archive for 100 key documents reflecting German history of the 20th century, including Hindenburg’s testimony before the Parliamentary Investigatory Committee (“The Stab in the Back”), manifestos and programs of various political parties and Karl Mannheim’s Das Problem der Generationen. All documents are available as scans of their original format.
Tag: Resource
Reviews in History
Since 1996, the Institute of Historical Research publishes Reviews in History, an electronic journal offering ‘reviews and reappraisals of significant work in all fields of historical interest’. Being an online resource, RiH is able to publish longer and more in-depth reviews (2000–3000 words) and also offers authors of reviewed books a chance for replying directly.
Bauhaus Online
The Bauhaus Archive Berlin, the Weimar Classic Foundation and the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation have created an online resource ‘for Bauhaus connoisseurs and enthusiasts’, offering a detailed (and appropriately well-presented) historical reference book, a magazine about the current impact of the famous design school and a calendar of Bauhaus-related events in Europe.
German History in Documents and Images
German History in Documents and Images (GHDI) is a comprehensive collection of primary source material documenting Germany’s political, social, and cultural history from 1500 to the present, created by the German Historical Institute in Washington, D.C. in cooperation with the Bildarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz, and IEG-MAPS (Institute for European History, Mainz). It comprises original German texts, all of which are accompanied by new English translations, and a wide range of visual imagery, including maps.
The section on Weimar Germany has been curated by Eric Weitz and Eric Roubinek and is divided into 14 categories, including Politics, Economics and Society, Architecture and Urban Life and Bodies and Sex. Featured documents include the Stinnes-Legien Agreement of 1918, Walter Gropius’ Program of the State Bauhaus in Weimar (1919), data on regional secondary school enrollment (1911, 1926/27, and 1938) and George Grosz’s painting ‘Pillars of Society’ (1926).
Support History Workshop Online
The History Workshop Online is seeking new contributions to the website: www.historyworkshop.org.uk. We are seeking new original articles, notices, comments and reviews of around 1000 words, as well as substantial multi-media essays which draw on the web’s ability to include images, audio and video to accompany text.
We are always happy to discuss proposed articles or postings: please get in touch with your ideas. To contact us, please email lorna@historyworkshop.org.uk
History Workshop Online is a forum, laboratory, and virtual coffeehouse devoted to the practice of radical history. Launched in 2011 by the editorial collective of History Workshop Journal, it offers debates, reflections, tools, and resources for anyone interested in connecting historical research with present-day politics, whether through engagement with public history, social history, the history of sexuality and gender, or intimate histories of everyday life.
Sozialistische Monatshefte Online
The SPD-affiliated Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung offers a digital archive of the Sozialistische Monatshefte, a socialist journal edited by Joseph Bloch and covering a wide range of topics from politics to arts. The archive covers all issues from 1897 – 1933.
Many thanks to Mary-Ann Middelkoop for the tip.
Simplicissimus and Jugend online
The satirical magazine Simpicissimus (1896-1945) and the cultural magazine Jugend (1896-1940) have been digitalized by a DFG-funded research group including the Literaturarchiv Marbach and the Klassik Stiftung Weimar.
Leo Baeck Institute Archive Online
Many original sources held at the Leo Baeck Institute are available online at the Internet Archive. Besides the private papers of eminent Weimar scholars and artists like Albert Einstein, Emil Ludwig, Joseph Roth, Ludwig Feuchtwanger, Thomas Mann and Alfred Schirokauer, the Leo Baeck archive also holds gems like a collection of Berlin theatre programs from 1913-1933 and the files of the intellectual magazine Der Neue Merkur.
Weimar Election Results
This privately-run website offers a meticulously maintained chronic of all election results of the Weimar Republic from the national to Länder (Prussia, Bavaria, etc.) level.
Weimar Legal Texts Online
The Dokumentarchiv hosts many original legal texts, acts and orders from the Weimar Republic, from the abdication of the Kaiser (‘Erlaß des Reichskanzlers Prinz Max von Baden über die Abdankung des Kaisers Wilhelm II.’) to the Locarno Treaties and the Enabling Act of 1933 (‘Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich’).
Das Tage-Buch Online
Das Tage-Buch, founded by Stefan Grossmann, was one of the most important intellectual magazines of the Weimar Republic, publishing articles, poems and stories by authors like E. E. Kisch, Bertolt Brecht and Erich Kästner. The volumes 1920-26 (when Grossmann resigned as editor) are available online on the Internet Archive.
Weimar Writers on Project Gutenberg
The German branch of the online library Project Gutenberg hosts many texts by authors active during the Weimar Republic, including journalists like Carl von Ossietzky, Kurt Tucholsky, Karl Kraus and Larissa Reissner; politicians like Rosa Luxemburg and Clara Zetkin; dramatists like Ernst Toller; philosophers like Walter Benjamin and Oswald Spengler; poets like Joachim Ringelnatz and Klabund; and writers like Joseph Roth, Hugo Ball, Artur Landsberger, René Schickele and Alfred Schirokauer.
Die Weltbühne Online
The entire back catalogue (1918-1933) of Die Weltbühne, one of the most important forums for leftist intellectuals in the Weimar Republic, has been uploaded to the Internet Archive. It can be viewed online or downloaded as PDF under the Creative Commons license.
Expressionists Online
German Literary Expressionism Online is a fully searchable database of 40,000 articles from 151 journals, magazines and anthologies from the Expressionist period, including key texts by Hugo Ball, Johannes R. Becher, Gottfried Benn, Georg Heym, Klabund, Else Lasker-Schüler, Georg Trakl and Franz Werfel.
The archive can be accessed (amongst others) in the Staatsbibliothek Berlin.
Vossische Zeitung online
The Staatsbibliothek Berlin offers a digitized, fully searchable archive of the Vossische Zeitung, charting the whole development of the Weimar Republic: ‘The Vossische Zeitung is one of the most outstanding sources for the study of political reporting and public opinion in Germany. The Vossische Zeitung Online 1918 – 1934 database contains every issue of the Berlin daily newspaper from the end of World War I to the beginning of the “Third Reich” with all of the newspaper’s coverage and commentaries on the political, social and cultural events of that epoch.’
To access this resource, you have to be logged into the network of the Staatsbibliothek as a registered user.