Thesis Lab: "The Source Course" (3 ECTS)
This multi-day course on location offers research MA-students and PhD candidates who are in the initial stage of their project the opportunity to reflect thoroughly on the primary sources they are going to use – in terms of typology, heuristics (theoretical) approaches, and methods of analysis – before specialists who first give short presentations on their own use of the same or similar source types.
The presentations by the participants (max. 30 minutes) must be built around specific texts, documents or visual data that are central to their research project, and explain something about:
1) heuristics (How have sources been traced, found and selected with respect to their potential research relevance? In what form are they available and accessible?),
2) source criticism (What rules of source criticism have been applied, including questions of reliability, authenticity and textual tradition?),
3) hermeneutics (What methods of textual or visual/pictorial interpretation have been applied?), and
4) informational value (What kind of valuable information are sources used expected to generate?).
Teacher
Dr I. Wolsing (Leiden): i.wolsing@hum.leidenuniv.nl
Registration
Register by e-mail before December 1 (with specification of subject dissertation / MA thesis as well as suggestions for specialists to be invited to participate in the course). Email: ozsmed@hum.leidenuniv.nl.