Dissecting Society
Nineteenth-Century Sociographic Journalism and the Formation of Ethnographic and Sociological Knowledge – (ERC Starting Grant, Laufzeit: 01.05.2020–31.08.2027)
Principal Investigator
Graduate Research Asisstant
- Previous team members
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Frauke Ahrens, M.A.
Dr. des. Alexandra Rabensteiner
Dr. Karin Riedl
Dr. Anna Kuprian
Dr. Adriana Markantonatos
Miguel Angel Pillado, PhD
Dr. Florian Grafl
About
The research project Dissecting Society. Nineteenth-Century Sociographic Journalism and the Formation of Ethnographic and Sociological Knowledge explores the connections between the rise of commercial media and an increased public and academic interest in social dynamics throughout the nineteenth century.
With the advent of market-oriented publishing, newspapers, illustrated magazines, books, (popular) encyclopedias, and various forms of visual media acted as drivers of the consolidation and dissemination of verbal and visual forms, which tracked changes in everyday practices, clothing habits, modes of transport and production, social roles, and urban and rural infrastructures.
These documentary-ethnographic representations of the social universe were strongly related to the concerns and practices of the professionalizing fields of sociology, folklore studies, statistics, and cultural anthropology. However, in the discipline-oriented histories of the social sciences and humanities, journalism and commercial print have been ignored as constitutive contexts of social knowledge production.
By exploring the ideological concerns, rhetoric techniques, and socio-material networks of sociographic journalism and literature, the project promises to institute a cross-genre, transdisciplinary, and transnational historiography of the evolution of social knowledge and to revise mono-disciplinary and Eurocentric tales of the past and present.
2026. Frauke Ahrens. "'An Eminently Complex World': Paul Sébillot’s Urban Folklore Studies and Non-academic Genres in late-19th Century France", Encyclopédie Bérose des histoires de l'anthropologie. https://www.berose.fr/article4228.html?lang=en.
2025. Karin Riedl. "Costumbrismo Peruano: Sociographic Knowledge, Nation-Building, and the Appropriation of European Literary Forms, 1840–1860." In Ethnography and Folklore in Print: Cross-Genre Explorations of Nineteenth-Century Social Knowledge. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag. Pp. 79–100.
2025. Adriana Markantonatos. "Social Complexity and Artistic Complicity in Early Parisian Caricature Journals." In Ethnography and Folklore in Print: Cross-Genre Explorations of Nineteenth-Century Social Knowledge. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag. Pp. 21–42.
2025. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "The Journalistic Folklore of Joseph Friedrich Lentner as Predisciplinary German Volkskunde", Encyclopédie Bérose des histoires de l'anthropologie. https://www.berose.fr/article4163.html.
2025. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "Ethnographer at Home, Social Reformer, Feminist? Amely Bölte’s Philanthropic Journalism and Ethnographic Gaze", Encyclopédie Bérose des histoires de l'anthropologie. https://www.berose.fr/article4120.html.
2025. Karin Riedl. "Adolfo Vienrich (1867–1908), an Early Peruvian Ethnographer and Radical Intellectual", Encyclopédie Bérose des histoires de l'anthropologie. https://www.berose.fr/article3962.html.
2025. Christiane Schwab. "Journalismus und Reportage." In: Andreas Blödorn/ Stefan Tetzlaff (eds.): Handbuch Realismus. Theorien – Medien – Kontexte. Stuttgart: Metzler. In press.
2025. Christiane Schwab/Frauke Ahrens/Karin Riedl (eds). Ethnography and Folklore in Print. Cross-Genre Explorations of Nineteenth-Century Social Knowledge. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag.
2024. Karin Riedl. "Stasis, Progress, and Evolution: Temporal Constructions Of Indigeneity and Nation in The Peruvian Press (1860–1900)."Andes, Antropología e Historia. Vol. 35, No 1.Pp. 18-48.
2023. Christiane Schwab. "Variations of Folkloristic Discourse in European Periodical Literature: Joseph Mainzer (1801–1851), Cecilia Böhl de Faber (1796–1877) and Adolf Glaßbrenner (1810–1867)", Estudios de literatura Oral Popular/ Studies in Oral Folk Literature [peer-reviewed], No. 12, 2023. Pp. 139–154.
2023. Christiane Schwab. "Between Natural History, Statistics, and the Social Novel: The Production of Ethnographic and Sociological Knowledge in the Context of Nineteenth-Century Sociographic Journalism", Journal of European Ethnology and Cultural Analysis (JEECA)[peer-reviewed], No. 6 (2). Pp. 95–112.
2023. Frauke Ahrens. "Zwischen Folklore-Forschung, Anthropologie und Journalismus. Paul Sébillots Légendes et curiosités des métiers (1895)", Historische Anthropologie, 31/1 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 13‒33.
2023. Frauke Ahrens. "Ethnografische Kunst oder bloß Typologie? Überlegungen zum Quellenwert publizistischer Illustrationen des 19. Jahrhunderts für eine volkskundlich-ethnologische Wissensgeschichte", Österreichische Zeitschrift für Volkskunde, 77/1 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 5‒28.
2022. Miguel Angel Pillado. "Antagonistas de la modernidad. La figura literaria de la partera en el costumbrismo iberoamericano." CIBERLETRAS. Revista de crítica literaria y de cultura – Journal of literary criticism and culture, No. 49. Pp. 89–105.
2022. Christiane Schwab. "Between Literary Entertainment, Public Engagement, and Social Research: Nineteenth-Century Investigative Reporting and the Case of ‘London Horrors’ (1861) by John Hollingshead", Journal of Language, Literature, and Culture [peer-reviewed]. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/20512856.2021.1979736?journalCode=yjli20
2022. Christiane Schwab. "Book Hawkers and Bricklayer’s Labourers. Social Types and the Production of Social Knowledge in Nineteenth-Century Periodical Literature", Nineteenth-Century Literature [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 403–426.
2022. Christiane Schwab. "Between Natural History, Statistics, and the Social Novel: The Production of Ethnographic and Sociological Knowledge in the Context of Nineteenth-Century Sociographic Journalism", Journal for European Ethnology and Cultural Analysis, 6/2 [peer-reviewed].
2022. Christiane Schwab. "Classes, Manners, Transformations. Popular Sociology in Periodical Literature (1830–1850)", Nineteenth-Century Contexts: An Interdisciplinary Journal. www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08905495.2022.2057149
2022. Miguel Angel Pillado. "Tales of Healers and Doctors: Enlighted Pedagogy and Modernization in Cuban Costumbrismo." In: Journal of Language and Literature [peer-reviewed]. Vol 22, No 1 (2022), Pp. 102-114.
2021. Christiane Schwab (ed.). Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag.
2021. Frauke Ahrens. "Das Carte de Visite-Porträt und die frühe Volkskunde. Wissensgeschichtliche Potentiale eines Fotoformats des 19. Jahrhunderts". In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 27–54.
2021. Anna Kuprian. "Adapting Parisian physiologies to the Streets of London: Albert Smith’s Social Zoology." In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 55–84.
2021. Adriana Markantonatos. "L’Illustration oder 'bloß' Illustration? Der Beitrag des 'Bildes' zu einer Geschichte sozialen Denkens und Wissens im Frankreich des frühen 19. Jahrhunderts." In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 85–114.
2021. Miguel Angel Pillado. "The china and the ranchero: Typecasting Mexicanness from Nineteenth-Century costumbrismo to Classical Mexican Cinema." In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 115–144.
2021. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "Die Ordnung der Gesellschaft. Perspektiven der publizistischen Gesellschaftsbeschreibungen im Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände/gebildete Leser (1807–1865)." In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 145–172.
2021. Christiane Schwab. "Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert." In: Christiane Schwab (ed.): Skizzen, Romane, Karikaturen. Populäre Genres als soziographische Wissensformate im 19. Jahrhundert. Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag. Pp. 9–26.
2021. Florian Grafl. "Die postkoloniale Welt im Journal – Gesellschaftsbeschreibungen in mexikanischen Literaturzeitschriften zur Zeit der Staatenbildung (1830–1860).", Hamburger Journal für Kulturanthropologie 13. Pp. 460–464.
2021. Adriana Markantonatos. "Gavarni – Geertz – Goffman. Wie illustrierte Journale Welt.Wissen.Gestalte(te)n.", Hamburger Journal für Kulturanthropologie, 13. Pp. 454–459.
2021. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "Gesellschaft schreiben, Gesellschaft wissen. Journalistische Genrebilder im Morgenblatt für gebildete Stände/Leser (1837–1847).", Hamburger Journal für Kulturanthropologie, 13. Pp. 115–122.
2021. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "'Don’t know much about history?' Pandemic Perspectives.", Transformations. A New Voice on Culture, Politics, and Change, 15.03. http://transformations-blog.com/dont-know-much-about-history-pandemic-perspectives/ [blog currently inactive]
2021. Christiane Schwab. "Local Publishing, Local Knowledge, Local Communication: The case of 'La Floresta Andaluza' (Seville, 1843–1844).", Journal of Iberian and Latin American Studies, 22/2 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 197–212.
2021. Christiane Schwab. "Zwischen Naturgeschichte, Statistik und Gesellschaftsroman: Soziographische Wissensordnungen im Kontext einer europäi-schen Publizistik im 19. Jahrhundert.", Zeitschrift für Volkskunde, 117/2 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 141–162.
2021. Christiane Schwab. "Zum Einfluss heterogener Wissenskonfigurationen auf journalistische Gesellschaftsbilder im 19. Jahrhundert.", Hamburger Journal für Kulturanthropologie, 13. Pp. 99–114.
2020. Alexandra Rabensteiner. "Wanted: A Mother of Cultural Studies.", Transformations. A New Voice on Culture, Politics, and Change, 13.02. http://transformations-blog.com/wanted-a-mother-of-cultural-studies/ [blog currently inactive]
2020. Christiane Schwab. "Die Welt im Journal. Das Pfennig-Magazin für Verbreitung gemeinnütziger Kenntnisse (1833–1855) als populäres Wissensformat.", Historische Anthropologie, 28/1 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 185–206.
2020 . Christiane Schwab. "Voices of Observation and Styles of Representation in Nineteenth-Century Sociographic Journalism.", History and Anthropology, 31/4 [peer-reviewed]. Pp. 417–439.
Ausstellung: Ins Bild gesetzt. Publizistische Grafik und Gesellschaftswissen, Paris 1830–1850, at the Institut français München, 6. Februar bis 13. März 2024.
Conference: "Ethnography, Folklore, and Nineteenth-Century Print Culture" at the Institute of European Ethnology and Cultural Analysis - LMU Munich, 23rd and 24th of June, 2022.