Workshop. Network Theory and Social Network Analysis - A training event for historians and archaeologists
Workshop February 10-12 2020 organised by Aglae Pizzone (CML/Danish Institute for Advanced Study) and Johannes Preiser-Kapeller (Austrian Academy of Sciences). The workshop will provide both an overview of basic concepts of network theory and their application in historical and archaeological research as well as an introduction into software tools and practical network analysis
This workshop aims to provide an introduction and an overview of the notions underlying and the tools provided by network theory. The focus will be on their application in the fields of history and archaeology. The course will also provide practical insights on the softwares used in network analysis.
During the workshop we will be looking in particular at:
- Nodes, Links and Degree. Basic concepts of quantitative network analysis
- Papyri, potsherds, people, sites, relations: theoretical consideration and examples of historical and archaeological network analysis
- From data to network model: organisation, processing and entering of relational data
- From the model to results: analysis, visualisation and interpretation of network models
In charge of the training event is Johannes Preiser Kapeller. Johannes obtained his PhD in Byzantine Studies from the University of Vienna and is Senior Research Associate at the Division for Byzantine Research/Institute for Medieval Research of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and Lecturer at the University of Vienna. His research focus is on Byzantine history in comparison and entanglement within the Medieval World as well as social and spatial network analysis, complexity theory and environmental history. Among his recent publications, the book Jenseits von Rom und Karl dem Großen. Aspekte der globalen Verflechtung in der langen Spätantike, 300-800 n. Chr. (Mandelbaum, 2018), shortlisted among the history books of the year 2018 by the journal “Damals” (3rd place in the category “works of overview”) and the paper, co-authored with Ekaterini Mitsiou, "The Little Ice Age and Byzantium within the Eastern Mediterranean, ca. 1200-1350 CE: old debates and new scenarios", in The Crisis of the 14th Century: Teleconnections between Environmental and Societal Change?, edited by Martin Bauch and Gerrit Jasper Schenk, pp. 190-219 (De Gruyter, 2019).
Program
Monday, February 10
| 09:30-12:30 | Nodes, Links and Degree. Basic concepts of quantitative network analysis (with a coffee break) |
| 12:30-13:30 | Lunch break |
| 13:30-16:30 | Papyri, potsherds, people, sites, relations: theoretical considerations and examples of historical and archaeological network analysis (with a coffee break) |
Tuesday, February 11
| 09:30-12:30 | From data to network model: organisation, processing and entering of relational data/practical work with data and software, part I (with a coffee break) |
| 12:30-13:30 | Lunch break |
| 13:30-16:30 | From the model to results: analysis, visualisation and interpretation of network models/practical work with data and software, part II (with a coffee break) |
Wednesday, February 12
| 09:30-12:00 | Open discussion [with input from instructor and participants]/possible consultation for individual research projects of the participants (with regard to conceptual or technical challenges) |