From Fall 2018 through Spring 2019, I undertook extra work in my upper-level German courses for an enhancement. I undertook a project that spanned the entire year and the two classes. GERM 401 (Fall 2018) focused on writing longer compositions in German, and GERM 330 (Spring 2019) focused on German history and culture.
For my enhancement, I did a research project on the impact of German castles. I’ve always liked castles, and I’d seen some while I was abroad last summer, so it seemed like a fun project to undertake. Since Germany has hundreds or thousands of castles (depending on what you count), I narrowed the scope of my research to five castles and their impacts. The castles I researched were Burg Maus, Burg Katz, Schloss Neuschwanstein, Schloss Charlottenburg, and Schloss Marburg.
In my research, I found several recurring uses of castles in medieval times:
- Use as military defense.
- Use as a residence for a noble or royal family.
- In later times, (i.e. the Protestant Reformation) as sites of religious debates.
I also found that there were several recurring categories for the modern use of the sites, most but not all of which are owned by the state government of the state they are located in.
- Use by the government for administrative purposes.
- Use by an institution for educational purposes (universities, archives, and museums).
- Use as a tourist attraction.
The culmination of my research is a paper which I intend to send to INCITE. I also created a more condensed version of my research to present at research day. My poster, which is attached, is the artifact for this enhancement. I created the poster as an outline for when people asked me questions, and it expands upon the central themes I noted above as well as describing what I learned about each individual castle.