This newsletter, which is concerned with various aspects of the Corona pandemic, was conceived and put together before the Russian attack on Ukraine. We have decided to send it despite the now completely changed priorities. At the same time, the administration of the Wissenschaftskolleg and the board of directors of the Fellows' Club desire to express their empathy and solidarity with the people in Ukraine. In this pressing situation, the Kolleg and the Fellows' Club see it as their duty to organize support for researchers who are endangered or had to flee, in cooperation with our national and international partners.
Editorial
In 1348, the plague known as the Black Death reached Florence, the city “beautiful more than all others in Italy”, and put it in a state of “general fright”. The results are devastating: 100,000 deaths are to be mourned. The epidemic shuts down the city’s life, wipes out entire families, and leads to impiety, selfishness, and the decline of morals. This is how Giovanni Boccaccio describes the pandemic situation in his collection of novellas, Il Decamerone, in which he does not neglect to include gruesome medical details.
read onTrajectories
Politics, Law, and Science in Times of the Pandemic
A conversation with Stefan Huster, Professor for Public Law, Social Security and Health Law, and Philosophy of Law at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Chairman of the Evaluation Commission on the Infection Protection Law, and Fellow in 2010/2011
read onMoments
Pandemics: The Maths, the Masks, the Madness
Virtual Evening Colloquium
C. Jessica E. Metcalf and Sanyu A. Mojola
January 19, 2022
read onNostalgia
Roni Taharlev: The Harbinger of Corona
In the spring of 2020, the Israeli painter Roni Taharlev invited a model into the Villa Walther. After the first sitting, the contours of a portrait could already be made out on the canvas. But a phone call ended the work abruptly: the model was infected with Covid-19!
read onMy favorite
Rachel Wheatley: Berlin with a Mask
In August, after not venturing much outside the ring road circumference of Oxford since March 2020, it felt pretty exciting to be boarding a flight to Berlin. Looking out of my new windows at Villa Walther and seeing a different landscape filled me with enthusiasm for exploring Berlin.
read onNews from the Fellows' Club
A Word from the Chairman
Like all institutions, the Fellows’ Club of the Wissenschaftskolleg also suffered from the current pandemic. The charter sees the point of the Club in carrying out events, with the goal of bringing current and former Fellows together. The Berliner Abend and the Members’ Assembly are the external signs of this, and they are intended as an occasion for former Fellows to come to Berlin and the Wissenschaftskolleg.
read onSave the dates – Meeting of the Fellows’ Club 2022
The program "Biodiversity: Conceptual Challenges in an Era of Rapid Change", that has been postponed twice, can now hopefully take place on June 9 and 10, 2022.
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