Danube: Environments, Histories & Cultures

Date: 4–11 June 2017

Workshop leaders and Organizers: Prof. Dr. Christof Mauch, Ann-Katrin Liepold, Pavla Šimková

This workshop was designed as an excursion from Munich to Bratislava. It brought together a group of professors and graduate students from the U.S., Germany and Austria who explored the world’s most international river from many different perspectives. We met more than a dozen environmental experts along the way and explored the river through the lens of a variety of different disciplines, such as hydrology and international relations, economics and geography, ecology and environmental history, conservation and civil engineering.

We asked how the river has shaped the lives of humans over time and how humans have shaped the river, its banks and its ecosystems to serve their own needs and interests. Certificate students played an active role in this seminar through the publication of an excursion guide and other activities.
The group used different means of transportation. We explored the river by bus, by boat, by foot, by street car and by bike. And we tried to understand the river, its watershed and its culture through the questions that different stakeholders and scientists might ask.