Progress on the Dissertation

Not much progress has been made on my MA Dissertation in terms of research. I've unfortunately had to focus on work for other classes. I've got two long essays due next week that I've been working on which means my dissertation is at a standstill for the moment. I should be able to continue with research after next week though.

PhD Funding Application

Yesterday, I completed the first draft of my PhD funding application. It is not as easy as you might suspect. I am absolutely looking forward to the opportunity to pursue my research goals, but it is certainly a grueling process getting there.

I have particular issues when it comes to the existing historiography as there really has not been much work done about the German aristocracy in the nineteenth century. I am planning a trip to Munich relatively soon so I can see what there is there in terms of local history books in the bookstores, libraries and especially the Ludwig-Maximilian-University's library. Hopefully something useful will emerge. I am also going to be looking into the archives there in Munich and the surrounding area for anything that might be of use.

Ideas and Sources

Today I had a discussion with a potential supervisor for my MA dissertation about the feasibility of a couple of ideas I have. My primary idea involves doing something in the direction of the relationship that the Bavarian aristocracy had with the royal court in Munich during the nineteenth century. I can imagine it would have been a fairly precarious relationship as the Wittelsbacher (the royal family) were put into power by Napoleon during the occupation by France in the early part of the century. We will see though.

A couple of interesting secondary sources I've found so far:

Conze, Eckart and Monika Wienfort. Adel und Moderne. Deutschland im europäischen Vergleich im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Cologne, Weimar, Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2004. ISBN: 3412186031

Elias, Norbert. Die höfische Gesellschaft: Untersuchungen zur Soziologie des Königtums und der höfischen Aristokratie. Suhrkamp Verlag, 2007. ISBN: 3518280236

Funck, Marcus and Stephan Malinowski. "Geschichte von oben" in Historische Anthropologie. Cologne, Weimar, Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 1999.

Reif, Heinz. Adel im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Munich: Oldenbourg Wissehschaftsverlag, 1999. IBSN: 3-486-55022-5

Schulz, Günther and Markus A. Denzel. Deutscher Adel im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert: Büdinger Forschungen zur Sozialgeschichte 2002 und 2003. St Katharinen, Germany: Skripta Mercaturae, 2004. ISBN: 3-89590-145-8

These I have found a way to get, but there are a couple of sources which I have not been able to find:

Kink, Barbara. Adelige Lebenswelt in Bayern im 18. Jahrhundert: Die Tage- und Ausgabenbücher des Freiherrn Sebastian von Pemler von Hurlach und Leutstetten (1718–1772). Munich: Kommission für bayerische Landesgeschichte , 2007. ISBN: 978-3-7696-6876-6

My Intentions with this Blog

I've created this blog with the intention of summarizing my research as it happens. As I deal with quite a lot of information, I feel it necessary to somehow sum up everything that I've researched in a day by writing it out. This method has helped me in the past with smaller projects and for those I have always used a regular notebook of some sort and have written them out by hand.

Now, however, I have a much larger task ahead of me. This is to research my MA dissertation which is going to be a project much larger than what I've done in the past. As such, I've decided to try summarizing my thoughts in the form of a blog. I've blogged before and am quite familiar with it, but this is going to be slightly different in that it will be completely informal. My main blog, History Rhymes, is a more formal affair with, for the most part, properly researched articles done specifically for publication on the blog. This will not be like that at all. It will simply be my outpourings as I work on my dissertation.