Dec 23, 2021
Our Year 2021 - We Wish You Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year!
The year 2021 is coming to a close at the Institute. Another year marked by Corona and the accompanying restrictions. However, there were also positive events and highlights in the past 12 months that we look back on with pleasure!
First and foremost, there have been some changes in personnel and, in addition to farewells, there welcomed new additions to the team. We are happy that Martin Fischer has joined the department as a research assistant and advisor for the Bachelor's programme Political Science. Right from the start, Martin was constantly responsible for teaching, which was enormously challenging, but also very exciting, as he says: "Appearing in the role of lecturer for the first time, guiding my students to deal in depth with what is happening in international politics and arousing enthusiasm for it in at least some of them, that was my highlight of the year".
Additionally, there are two new research assistants and doctoral students, Sofie Roehrig and Maria Weickardt Soares, who started working for us as part of the FRAMENET research project. Maria writes: "In 2021, my professional career has developed enormously. One of my highlights was being accepted as a PhD student by Prof. Holzscheiter at TU Dresden, which has given me the option to not only continue researching in global health, but also to work in an international team and pursue a cotutelle."
3 months ago, Andrea Kaskel took over the secretariat of International Relations and Legal and Constitutional Theory and looks back positively: "After being warmly welcomed and pestering all those present and absent with questions, I now feel I am slowly settling in and am looking forward to 2022 with quite a lot of presence. Many thanks to all!
We are very happy about the new additions to the team that 2021 has brought us!
For Prof. Anna Holzscheiter, meeting her Swedish partners in Linköping was a highlight. The focus was on the joint project on "Youth Representation in Global Politics".
In addition, there was the joy of having had the opportunity to work from Dresden again at least in the summer and autumn and to meet the team in person.
With regard to the Institute of Political Science, it is worth emphasizing that the new colleagues Prof. Nikita Dhawan and Prof. Marianne Kneuer have started and taken over the chairs of Political Systems and System Comparisons and Political Theory and History of Ideas. This will enable the Institute of Political Science to break new grounds in the coming year.
Of course, we are aware that besides home office, online university can also be tough at times. Dr. Christine Andrä emphasizes all the more that her highlight was the students "who persevered with the online teaching, who came to Zoom sessions and joined in the discussions, who managed projects, who wrote term papers and theses, who worked with us as student assistants, in short: who didn't let the pandemic get them down, despite the enormous strain it put on them. Without students, there's no university!"
In addition, there were also smaller highlights for Christine, such as a publication she had been working on with two colleagues from Colombia and the UK since autumn 2019, which was finally published in the summer, as well as a PhD defense at PUC-Rio, in which she was an external committee member (via Zoom).
Dr Erik Fitzsche also looks back very positively on 2021 - both personally and professionally. He sums it up as follows: "2021 was actually a nice year: I played a lot with our son, a lively blond child named Arthur, and discovered many exiting things with him: for example, how to go up a ladder, that you can really ride a tram, but above all how good ice cream tastes. I have read more novels than ever before, many of them crime novels, especially those in which eating and drinking are better than murdering. Brunetti sends his regards. But a special, almost shockingly intense experience was when I was once again standing in front of a seminar in presence in October. It was like in spring when the ground thaws and you begin to smell the earth: it is only then that you notice that the world has a smell. Standing in the seminar, I suddenly noticed how vivid everything was: the 3-D optics, the light on the wooden floor, the colors of the jumpers, the eyes watching you, the chalk smearing on the blackboard, the freedom of movement behind the "teacher's desk", the smell of the heated air. And of course, the interaction: a hand signal, a look, the sound of voices, how it not only reaches the ears but hits the body, and how I have to speak louder and may emphasize more. I often remembered it afterwards because it was so impressive and had a lasting effect. For 2022, I would like to see more of that."
That's what not only Erik wishes, but the entire team of the professorship. In this spirit, we wish you happy holidays, a happy new year and, above all, good health for the coming year!