Enormous urban growth—and with it, the rapid transformation of the urban environment—took on a new dimension with the onset of industrialization. These tangible transformations gave rise to numerous new challenges and a multifaceted, ongoing debate about central issues that became increasingly pressing with modern urbanization. Among the most important questions were those concerning the design of a livable urban environment. How could the city be and remain a place worth living in, and how could the ever-changing conglomerate of people gathered within it be transformed into a community? What concerns people today in various fields, such as politics or urban planning, was already, in earlier eras, an unmistakable backdrop to the changing urban landscape. In the rapidly expanding metropolises of the 19th century, one answer to these questions lay in the attempt to bring the countryside into the city. A look at Western metropolises such as London, New York, Madrid, and Barcelona illustrates the internationally observable effort at that time to counterbalance or even eliminate the negative aspects of change by establishing parks that were accessible to all residents. Spending time in the city’s green spaces was intended to bring calm, grounding, strength, and healing to both individuals and urban society as a whole, thereby ultimately helping to stabilize existing social conditions.

Factory tourism is generally known to the public primarily as a contemporary phenomenon, such as tours of breweries or automobile manufacturing plants. In fact, however, factories in German-speaking countries had already been increasingly becoming places of tourist interest as early as the 1890s. Just as traveling to foreign countries did, exploring the unknown right on one’s own doorstep became particularly appealing to the middle class. This is evidenced not only by richly illustrated reports in magazines but also by tourist materials such as postcards bearing greetings from the factory, descriptions of tour itineraries for visiting groups from company records, and menus for multi-course banquets that some companies hosted for their guests. As a result, factory visits came to be regarded on par with trips to exotic countries, modern metropolises, or visits to classic attractions such as museums. The research project reveals that, in addition to curiosity about the foreign and the unknown, the visitors’ motivations included a search for their own identity within the unfamiliar surroundings of the factory halls. The transformation of the factory—a place of work—into a tourist attraction created a new tourist space in which the bourgeoisie reinvented itself in the face of the dual challenge posed by the increasingly aggressive demands of social opponents and by the crises arising from the transition to modernity. In this context, the encounter with technology became a spectacle focused less on factual understanding and more on the extraordinary personal experience.

When Charles Darwin published his theory of the evolution of species through natural selection in 1859, he already foresaw a major debate, though he did not anticipate its far-reaching impact and longevity. The Darwin Year 2009 provided a good opportunity to reflect on this debate—which has remained highly controversial and multifaceted for over 150 years—as well as its theses and its course, a debate that has been waged in ever-changing contexts—with both familiar and new arguments—not only in the natural sciences but also, for a long time now, in politics, society, and culture. The debate, in its historical and contemporary forms, was the subject of interdisciplinary scholarly discussion at a major conference in September 2009. The results of the conference were incorporated into a comprehensive book project, which was published in October 2017 under the title *The Evolution Controversy: A Cultural History. The 40 contributions in the volume are aimed equally at researchers and an interested lay audience, and present the scientific and popular debates surrounding the topic of evolution across seven thematic areas. In addition to the implications for the sciences, belief in God, and moral concepts, the book addresses reflections on society, politics, international relations, and interventions down to the level of the individual and their genetic material—their genes—as well as questions regarding a supposed decline of humanity. Today, these controversies are even more diverse, involve far more people than they did in the late 19th century, and have far more serious consequences.

The industrial mode of production, which began in the 18th century, brought about a truly revolutionary transformation in the course of about a hundred years, upending the lives of people, which had until then been uniform and manageable for a long time. The resulting profound changes in economic activity, work, housing, community life, and even ways of thinking continue to shape our present day. Where did the innovations that were to transform life so fundamentally come from? Why did this development take hold in one particular country in Europe rather than in another there or on a different continent? How did the changes in the economy spill over into other areas of life, such as housing, transportation, communication, social structures, and social interaction? Industrialization began in Great Britain, but this by no means predetermined its subsequent course in countries such as Belgium, France, and the German states. Each country underwent the process under its own unique circumstances. This publication examines the course of events in Great Britain and the German states—or the German Empire—to trace, from a cultural-historical perspective, various aspects of industrialization and its consequences, which had led to a “nervous age” by the end of the 19th century at the latest. The historical account is complemented by an examination of the key controversies within the field of historical scholarship at the time.

This research project focuses on hearing and the (auditory) experience of sounds in the three industrial cities of Erfurt, Essen, and Birmingham. It examines discourses, practices, and bodies of knowledge concerning sensory perception and their transformation between 1880 and 1960. Making noise is understood here as a practice that signifies power and domination. It can take on economic, legal, medical, social, cultural, technological, or political dimensions. Its content stems from experiences, memories, and encounters with sound. These created diverse bodies of (auditory) knowledge that have shaped the human understanding of noise and sound right up to the present day. They arise in phonotopes, travel along auditory pathways, and contain acoustic elements that are imbued with specific values through social negotiations. Therefore, they are not simply numerical values of sound energy moving within a space for action, work, or leisure, or between people. Nevertheless, the social dimension of hearing, the desire for silence, and the experience of noise were consistently overlooked in decision-making for a long time. Among other things, this promoted the standardization of limit values based solely on (minimum) criteria that hardly restricted—or only did so with a time lag—economic exploitation and profit maximization. For a long time, the protection of noisy machinery was considered more important, both socially and economically, than the protection of citizens’ health. Against this backdrop of tension, the project investigates how conflict-ridden negotiation processes surrounding the various acoustic spaces in a city developed.

Food and migration are two closely intertwined phenomena. Migrants bring their specific dietary traditions with them to their new home as part of their cultural heritage, not least to reaffirm their own identity. The host society perceives migrants—not least through their dietary habits—as “others,” as strangers. The goal of the research project, which culminated, among other things, in an exhibition project with students, is, first, to investigate the identity-forming and differentiating effects of traditions in the realm of food, and second, to examine how these differences are overcome in the course of the acculturation process through changes in the eating and drinking habits of people with an immigrant background as well as those of the host society. The specific immigrant groups under focus are the displaced persons from Silesia after World War II and the labor migrants and their families from Southern Europe in the 1970s. Their perceptions were to be explored primarily through oral history interviews.

During the Nazi regime, the acoustic control of public space had a technological dimension, a propagandistic dimension, and a dimension aimed at warning the population in the event of a disaster. Radio masts and loudspeaker systems created public “auditory spaces.” Although temporary, these spaces could be repeatedly recreated; residents were turned into listeners and brought together, with coercion and consent equally shaping these formations. From the distracted, disinterested “mass” of people emerged a “people” who listened and heeded speeches. The underlying motives and interests of local politics, companies in the broadcasting industry, and various Reich ministries form the core of this research. The project highlights which (sonic) aesthetic concepts guided the sound design, attunement, and auditory control of citizens during the Nazi regime, and what effects these had on people’s experiences, expectations, and memories of listening. Alongside propaganda as a significant factor, the economic exploitation of these acoustic spaces also plays a role. On the other hand, the offerings were well-received by the public, who were willing to make use of them. The resulting scope for action available to the various groups of actors is understood as part of a complex interplay between the regime and other active individuals, organizations, and companies. Thus, the project contributes to an understanding of Nazi rule and its acceptance among the German population.