In 2021/22, the Instagram project @ichbinsophiescholl of the public broadcasters SWR and BR let users participate in the last 10 months of the life of a remediated Sophie Scholl, played by Luna Wedler. A new anthology now examines this project from different academic perspectives and asks how history can be told in social media.
The HBI researchers Hans-Ulrich Wagner, Jan Rau, Daria Chrepurko, Clara Linnekugel and Daniel Wehrend have collaborated on this project. In their paper, they use a mixed-methods analysis to examine the user comments on the account @ichbinsophiescholl. The diversity of reactions to the quote is surprising. They range from parasocial interaction and diverse forms of dealing with feelings to different references to the historical topic, including actualizations and generalizations that are largely detached from the historical starting point. The results show that historical social media projects go far beyond the transmission of historical knowledge and that the question of an “appropriation” of history must be posed anew. The study was conducted as part of the Leibniz Research Network “Value of the Past” within the Research Lab “Practices of Appropriation”.
The anthology is published by Wallstein Verlag and edited by Mia Berg and Christian Kuchler.