WORKSHOP: HISTORISCHE BENELUXFORSCHUNG UND DIGITAL HISTORY - Arbeitskreis Deutsch-Niederländische Geschichte, Arbeitskreis Historische Belgienforschung, Fachinformationsdienst Benelux / Low Countries Studies - Nina Janz (University of Luxembourg): WARLUX: The Impact and Legacy of War Experiences in Luxembourg

1. University of Luxembourg
Multilingual. Personalised. Connected.

2. WARLUX – Soldiers and their communities in WWII: The
impact and legacy of war experiences in Luxembourg
Dr. Nina Janz

3. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
q Introduction
q About Project WARLUX
q Research Approach – Dataset
q Sources, Access
q Digital approach
q Structering data
q Linking and filtering data

4. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Research – Biographies of concscripts born 1920-1927 who served in
Reichsarbeitsdienst and Wehrmacht
• around 11.000 in total (estimated numbers)
• In this case study – ca. 3000 indviduals
• From three different groups
• South – industrial, steel and mine workers (Schifflange, Esch/Alzette)
• North – rural, famers (Clervaux, Weiswampach,Ulflingen etc.)
• High school students in different Lycée in Luxembourg – educated social
groups

5. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Research approach
• Bottom up perspective of the group
• National official narrative so far: “Ons Jongen”, “ons Meedercher”, victims, heroes,
collaborators…….
• ”zoom – in” into the individuals and their stories
• linking the individuals with their communities (town/village, familiy, friends, social
background, personality, conscies decisions (forced, volunteer?) and experiences
during and after the war
• Connection/linking to “home” – coping with occupation, with the absence of sons,
brothers, husbands and others

6. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
How to proceed?
Collecting data
• What
• enlistments, organizational documents, military records….
• Personal records (letters, diaries, memoirs….)
• interviews
• How
• Digiziting, announcments in the local newspapers, crowdsourcing
• Conducting interviews

7. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Structering the data set
• “External/Formal” conditions – Name, Date, place - gender,
residence, etc.
• Recruitment, unit of Wehrmacht and/or Reichsarbeitsdienst
• Training camp, ”route” of fighting
• POW camps, repratrieted
And?
• personal information (memoirs, interviews etc.)
• Define “internal” conditions like homesickness, fascniation for ideologies,
• Finding “roles” (label, tagging)

8. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Data management and analysing
• Using spreadsheets, folders….
• Growing amount of data (“massive spreadsheet”…)
• Making entities between different information
• Filtering, extracting, changing
• Data visualization, mapping

9. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
What we need is to
• Filter and to analsyse in its complexity
• Between the indivudals as object and its nework (group)
name#1 RAD-camp#1
place#1
name#2 place#2 rapatrieted#y/n
Wehrmacht unit#2
POWcamp#1

10. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Relational database - nodegoat
• data management, an analysis and visualisation tool
Bree, P. van, Kessels, G., (2013). nodegoat: a web-based data management, network analysis & visualisation environment,
http://nodegoat.net from LAB1100, http://lab1100.com

11. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Attributes

12. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Data model
• Creating relational
structure and entities
• Object – not only the
individual
• Object is also a POW
camp, a unit, a
community
(town/village),
profession, military
rang etc.

13. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Vidualization

14. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Uncertainties
• Unknown or
unprecise
geographical
data - Died at
the Eastern
Front?
• Russia, USSR?
• Unknown dates
(define periods
and time
frames)

15. WARLUX: The impact and legacy of war
experiences in Luxembourg
Conclusion – Data set for studying biographies and the impact of war experiences
• Collect and manage data
• Digital tool in analyzing and filtering the data set
• Zooming ”in” and “out” –individuals as objects, linked to their communities
• Visualizations and mapping, statistical overviews
• Flexible for other research questions
• Preservation and storage

16. Stay connected with us!
www.c2dh.uni.lu
@C2DH_LU
https://www.facebook.com/c2dh.lu/
@warlux_c2dh
Blog: “Digital War History” and WARLUX
https://digiwarhist.hypotheses.org