Modern India in German Archives, 1706-1989 (MIDA)

A multitude of short- and long-term exchange relationships, which developed between German-speaking areas of Europe and the Indian subcontinent since the early modern era, contributed to comprehensive and as yet insufficiently used India-related historical source materials. The project has five key objectives: 1. To systematically record the German archive resources related to the history of modern India and the history of Indo-German interconnection in a database and create an index of keywords, starting with the establishment of the D?nisch-Hallesche Mission in South India (1706) and ending with the German reunification (1989/90); 2. To make this database available for international researchers as a growing/sustainable open resource database for specific research; 3. To gradually create a digital archive guide by systematically recording the archive resources, which enables international research and also permits a wider audience an overview of the relevant archive resources in their thematic diversity; 4. To demonstrate the potential of German archive resources in an exemplary way through a series of pilot research projects and a resultant publication series in order to a) promote intensive research especially by German and Indian historians as well as b) create the necessary multilingual and interregional qualification profiles; 5. To contribute through targeted measures, namely through an Indo-German tandem structure of pilot projects, to a sustainable realization to the aim of intensifying Indo-German research relationships in the humanities as formulated during the bilateral symposium of the DFG and the Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) held in November 2012. The long-term project MIDA, first funded by DFG in 2014 and re-approved on 12th of July 2017, aims at 1. Including the history of economics. So far, the survey mainly focused on political relations and the field of humanities; 2. Further exploration and digitization as well as systematization of the database according to principles of pertinence; including a thesaurus; 3. Individual research within the framework of MIDA; postdoctoral research projects and PhD projects; 4. To put a focus on the natural sciences and the archival collections related to cooperation between Indian and German (natural) scientists 5. Missionary archives; interlacing or new systematization of the archival collections of Frankesche Stiftungen, Halle.