Study Group "The (long) 70s" (until 2012)

Based on the input of an international workshop of the cluster of excellence entitled “The 70s – were they also a ‘Black Decade’?” in April 2009, the study group “The (long) 70s” was formed in December 2009. After its first organisational meeting in late January 2010, the study group has now taken up its work and established the work programme for 2010.

First of all, the joint activities will focus on various concepts, structures and processes of the period “after the boom” (Doering-Manteuffel/Raphael). Scientific and technical development, cultural globalisation, conflicting trends of international political homogenisation and of local differentiation, medialisation of society and general structural change of the long 70s are but a few of the main topics that will shape the discussions during the first stage.

The second stage will deal more intensively with single projects and their regional characteristics as these, in addition to periodisation, are an important point of reference for the joint interdisciplinary and cross-regional work.
As of October 2010, the web of religion and politics of the 70s will be focussed from a global/local perspective. The following topics and problems will be elaborated, among others:

• society’s (assumed) value change;
• the post-modern turning towards the self;
• the ethics of the re-emerging (not only political) violence and those of pacifism:
• the new forms of religiosity;
• the balancing act between Christian conservatism and Christian social doctrine;
• the utopian and social projects of the 70s.

The members of this new study group would like to cordially invite all interested cluster scholars whose projects or research interests centre on the period of or around the 1970s. 

New members as well as thematic and functional input are very welcome.