Social Uses of War Ruins: Resilience, Commemorations and Heritage – RUINES

A precise corpus is base on 5 case studies : the Hauts-de-France, the Alps, Normandy, Lorraine and Centre-West. These four cases will enable us to compile a comprehensive bibliographic, iconographic, documentary, musical and cartographic data base. This exhaustive data base will help a comparartive approach to access the importantce of localy in the way that society relates to the ruins. Comparison with other European examples asseses internationalisation of memories. Through these cases the intention is to outline the contours of a transnational history of war memories as a guide for early globalisation of relationships with the past.

- Starting meeting, feb. 18th, 2020, MSH Paris-Nord
- - Redefinition of the scope of participants
- Consortium contract (discontinued)
- Expansion of the international partnership
- Research stay of Heather Warfield (Concord Univ.)
- Construction of the database (Sept 2020-Sept 2021)
- recruitment of a development engineer
- recruitment of a post-doc researcher (Sept 21-June 21)
- Creation of a monthly research seminar (distance learning)
- participation in research seminars
- Master's theses (12)
- Working group on Oradour sur Glane (June 21)
- Definition of research protocols for an oral survey / CNIL
- Ici-Avant Oradour application
- service contract for the application
- DPMA AAP (June 21)
- Survey of the public at the Oradour sur Glane site
- recruitment of a post-doc researcher: exhibition curator (Sept-20 May 21)
- Data management plan

- Submission of an application to a Horizon 21-27 call for projects: «Digital heritage curation of modern conflicts« (Jan 2022)
- Opening of the database on 1 Oct 2021
- Colloquium «Les ruines de guerre: écrire, figurer, recomposer (XXe et XXIe siècles)«, Nanterre, 14-16 October 2021
- Seminar «Martyred villages in Europe«: 1) Oradour: Feb 22 2) Marzabotto Sept 22
- Doctoral workshop «Traces and representations of the past in monuments and heritage, XIX-XXI century (Europe-Latin America)«, Casa de Velazquez, May 22
- Exhibition «Objects that survived the massacre«, CMO, June 22
- Documentary «Les traces de la guerre«, France 3, 11 Nov 21.

- RUINES blog on Hypotheses.org
- Data management plan
- Catalogue of the exhibition Mémoires à l'Historial de Péronne : «The ruins of the First World War« ; video
- • Article «Ruines de guerre«, Encyclopédie d'histoire numérique de l'Europe, ehne.fr/fr/encyclopedie/thématiques/guerres-traces-mémoires/mémorialisation/ruines-de-guerre.
• Article «Belchite, lieu de mémoires de la guerre d'Espagne«, Encyclopédie d'histoire numérique de l'Europe, ehne.fr/fr/encyclopedie/thématiques/guerres-traces-mémoires/mémorialisation/belchite-lieu-de-mémoires-de-la-guerre-d’espagne

The purpose of the RUINES project is to analyse the evolution of political and social uses of wae ruines from 16th c. to the present day, as vehicles and symptoms of a systematic historical view characterised by the conversion of warlike events as tokens of a contemporary world that is essentially catastrophic and traumatic.. The central hypothesis is that the way in which societies relate to the vestiges of war says something about how they relate to the past. The originality of this approach lies in its large- or medium-scale focus on cases, which makes it possible to gauge very precisely the impact of ruins on society. In short, the study will allow us to measure the heuristic value of the notion of "war landscapes". It thus falls within theme 4.2 "Cultures, creation and heritages", ans secondaruli within theme 8.6 "Digital revolution", using digital tools (Ici/Avant). It has 4 themes : the day-to-day of ruines (1), the political uses of reconstruction (2), the heritagisation of ruines and dark tourism (3), digital humanities (4).

A precise corpus is base on 4 case studies : the Hauts-de-France, the Alps, Normandy and Centre-West. These four cases will enable us to compile a comprehensive bibliographic, iconographic, documentary, musical and cartographic data base. This exhaustive data base will help a comparartive approach to access the importantce of localy in the way that society relates to the ruins. Comparison with other European examples asseses internationalisation of memories. Through these cases the intention is to outline the contours of a transnational history of war memories as a guide for early globalisation of relationships with the past.

This project is base on the cooperation of four research centers : IRHiS (Lilleà, HisTéMé (Caen), LARHRA (Grenoble) and CRIHAM (Poitiers-Limoges). It enjoys support from the Ecole du Louvre, the Centre de la Mémoire d'Oradour, the Memorial of Caen, the Historial of Péronne, and a large network of european universities. Comprising twenty five experts from a mix of nine several disciplines (historians, geographers, art historians, anthropologists, psychologist, archeologist, litterature, architects), RUINES addresses a variety of fields from a multi-disciplinary viewpoint. The RUINES project requires funding totalling €298 000 for 48 month.

In RUINES dissemination activities are considered essential for purposes of a science that is participative and inclusive, but also for local economic development. Taking four examples as an experimental field (Oradour, Falaise, Arras and Vessieux), it is proposed to create war ruin circuits based on an innovative digital tool enabling visitors to view period images on-the-spot and read explanations : Ici-Avant. The application will provide visitors with the opportunity to produce content through participation in documentary data collection. This experiment will ultimately serve for the study of informational and cultural practices induced by the use of digital techniques relating to heritage: the results of this visitor survey will help the associated specialist institutions to develop a tool to help them define their public policies.

RUINES will sponsor: 1/ two major encounters between researchers and a international workshop payed by Memorial de Caen 2/ an exhibition about ruins and contemporary arts 3/ a digital production, essential both for the conduct of the project and for the evaluation of results via Open Access. 4/ an original application Ici-Avant. 3/ on the training side, a doctoral school on "Portrayals of ruins in Europe", through which to initiate doctorands in discussions and collaborative practices. 4/ several deliverables: a publication reporting the results of the project (with a version in English) and a white paper on "the war ruins heritage and public", targeting heritage professionals.