Multimedia Archive of Jewish Authors in Berlin 1933-1945 (AjAB)

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Kerstin Schoor
• Subject Area: General and Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies ; German Literary and Cultural Studies (Modern German Literature)
• Term: from 2014 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 242719874

With the establishment of a multimedia Archive of Jewish Authors in Berlin 1933-1945 (AjAB) at the Europa-Universität Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder), the Axel Springer Foundation Chair for German-Jewish Literature and Cultural History, Exil and Migration has introduced a virtual component to its ongoing documentation of the persecution of Jewish authors within Germany under National Socialism.For the first time, the AjAB is documenting - with nearly 1,200 bio-bibliographies - the activities of authors of Jewish background who were living in Berlin after 1933, under one thematic focus. The AjAB is supported in this endeavor through an institutional network consisting of the University Library (UB) and Information, Communication and Multimediacenter (IKMZ) of the Europa-Universität Viadrina; the University Library of the Freie Universität Berlin; the Center of Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg; the Archive of the Jewish Museum Berlin; the German Literature Archive at Marbach am Neckar; the TextGrid Project at the University Library Göttingen; and the Konrad Zuse Institute Berlin (ZIB). Rare primary texts (books as well as newspaper and magazine articles) and original documents, photos and videos will be available for research and instruction purposes on an online platform. Under the umbrella of this collection - via internal and external links with international institutions and archives, with decades of research on literature by antifascist authors in exile, literature of the so-called inner emigration and with works written under the National Socialist regime - the AjAB provides access to documents and testimonies for comparative study of the literary life of authors of Jewish background and their cultural and literary activities in Berlin under National Socialism. The AjAB will be the first-ever, internationally accessible virtual research environment to focus on this new literary field for study and instruction, from the perspective of librarians, archivists and researchers. By charting spatial contexts on historical maps, and by building personal contacts through the use of network diagrams, the AjAB offers low-threshold access and is thus also aimed at users outside the specialist community. With its digital approach and its links to international scientific institutions and archives, it represents an exemplary bridge between archive, library and the research and teaching platform. As a research and digitization project, it is integrated into research at the Zentrum Jüdische Studien Berlin-Brandenburg.

• DFG Programme: Cataloguing and Digitisation (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)