Research Projects in the Academies Program

The joint research program of the German academies of sciences is dedicated to cataloging, preserving, and studying our cultural heritage.

The Academies Program is Germany’s largest research program in the humanities and social sciences and holds a prominent position internationally. With its long-term basic research projects, it makes a significant contribution to the cataloging, preservation, and scholarly analysis of key sources and artifacts of cultural heritage.

Through editions, dictionaries, and text corpora, it creates sustainable knowledge resources of high scholarly relevance, which are increasingly available to researchers and the public in digital form as well.

Dictionary

Das Deutsche Rechtswörterbuch (DRW)

A research project is compiling a comprehensive dictionary of historical German and West Germanic legal language—from the beginning of the written tradition in late antiquity through the early 19th century.

Cultural Studies

German Inscriptions of the Middle Ages (DI)

The research project's mission is to catalog and publish annotated editions of Latin and German-language inscriptions from the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period up to the year 1650 in Baden-Württemberg.

Cultural Studies

Knowledge Networks in Medieval Romance Speaking Europe (ALMA)

This inter-academic project examines how new vernacular knowledge networks emerged in the Romance-speaking cultural sphere of the Middle Ages, combining methods from textual criticism, historical linguistics, and the Semantic Web.

Cultural Studies

Hindu Temple Legends in South India

The project produces digital editions of the temple legends of the South Indian city of Kanchipuram and compiling them alongside documentation on temple architecture, iconography, rituals, and oral traditions.

Edition

Bible Glossaries as Hidden Cultural Carriers

Das judaistisch-romanistische Projekt ist ein Beitrag zur judäo-französischen Sprach- und Literaturtradition, die in ihrer kulturwissenschaftlichen, linguistischen und theologiegeschichtlichen Bedeutung erstmals und interdisziplinär aufgearbeitet werden soll.

Economics

Financial and Business Research from a Long-Term Perspective

Inter-academic research project aimed at creating a new database that will contribute to a better understanding of past, present, and future economic and social challenges.

Dictionary

Goethe-Woerterbuch

The Goethe-Woerterbuch is a dictionary of meanings organized by individual words that presents Goethe's entire vocabulary in alphabetical order.

Coordination of the Academies Program is the responsibility of the Union of the German Academies of Sciences and Humanities, which comprises eight academies based in Berlin, Düsseldorf, Göttingen, Hamburg, Heidelberg, Leipzig, Mainz, and Munich. In this role, the Union coordinates the academies’ joint work and provides organizational and scholarly support for the projects of the Academies Program. Around 900 staff are currently working on 130 projects at 198 locations within the Academies Program.

Research Projects

State Projects Externally Funded Young Academy Completed Projects