What do monuments do? Do they still offer a reason for identification in a uniting Europe? If so, with what or with whom, or what? May monuments be changed or toppled? What value do monuments have today? What should new monuments look like and what should they represent? These are just a few of the many possible questions that can be the subject of a joint investigation in a common project. National monuments should be the starting point for the joint work. Accordingly, the project has a regional historical focus and becomes supra-regional by working with several european schools. For each monument, even if there are several monuments on site, a documentation should be created and thus promote the propaedeutic work and the use of modern media such as iPads. The documentation to be created will record the circumstances of the erection and use historical sources to document the symbolic value the monument had at the time of its erection and the event to which it was linked. The pupils should discover the monument in real life on site and record the actual state of the monument as well as the current state of research. Experts on site should be involved in this process. In addition to the propaedeutic work in the subject history, the socio-cultural contents should not be neglected. Pupils should have the opportunity to question local people about its symbolic value today. Part of the questioning should also be the person's relationship to the European Union and whether the monument has a pan-European value. Although the project has a historical focus, there are numerous links to other subjects. An overarching aspect could be an internal competition in the field of art with the aim of designing a pan-European monument. A jury of colleagues and the students could then evaluate the designs and award prizes to the three best designs during the final meeting. The aim of the project is to work out the different meanings of national monuments against their historical background and to examine whether a change in meaning or interpretation has also taken place against the background of a unifying Europe. The question arises whether monuments of national importance are still relevant today. The techniques required in history lessons for the investigation and interpretation of sources and representations should be the focus of the interpretation work. In terms of cultural history, the current level of awareness and the significance of the respective monuments in the population should be investigated by means of surveys.
What do monuments achieve? Do they still offer a reason for identification in a unifying Europe? If so, with what or with whom, or what? May monuments be changed or overthrown? What is the value of monuments today? What should new monuments look like and what should they represent? National monuments or monuments of high emotional regional and supra-regional value, of national and international importance are the occasion and subject of the investigations during the different project weeks. Accordingly, the project has a regional historical focus and becomes supra-regional through the joint work. The aim was to document the monuments based on the exemplary work on the Hermann Monument in Detmold, a monument that has undergone an astonishing transformation from a symbol of national fortitude, to a heroic figure in the Nazi era, to the demythicization of the monument to an almost pure excursion site. The discovery of the regional and supra-regional history, which is and was conveyed by the monuments, as well as the elaboration of the genesis, the historical and current significance of the monuments, were the focus of the joint work. The scientific-propaedeutic work was promoted methodically and medially. Local experts were involved. The documentation produced records the circumstances of the erection and documents, by means of historical sources, what symbolic value the monument had at the time of its erection and what event it was associated with. One of the aims of the project is to work out the different meanings of national monuments against their historical background and to investigate whether a change in meaning or interpretation has also taken place against the background of a unifying Europe. This raises the question of whether monuments with national significance are still relevant today. The corona pandemic prevented an immediate implementation of the plans and led to delays in the process, forced in part to rescheduling, but without losing sight of the main objectives. However, due to lack of time, the implementation of a final meeting to discuss whether to dedicate a monument to Europe, and if so, what should it look like, was regrettably no longer feasible.