When our group first came together, we had (or at least we thought we had) a clear idea as to where we want to go with this year’s symposium. We were set to pursue Uruguay and picked up Argentina along the way as our initial region of choice. Could Symposium life really be this easy? Could we simply choose a region that we knew so little about and simply decide, “Hey let’s make this our focus!” OF COURSE NOT! What do these two countries have in common? Is there a strong community in the GTA? Who will we approach to supervise our endeavors? Things weren’t going so smooth after all.
Back to square one! From Uruguay and Argentina, to Chile, to South Korea, and a number of countries located in Eastern Europe, nothing seemed to click. Things just weren’t happening for us.
Then came Germany, the light at the end of the tunnel. Why hadn’t we thought of Germany in the first place? I can’t really say. Germany quickly took hold of our interest. As the world’s fourth largest economy and a major player in a number of international global institutions, not to mention its recent ambitions to reduce its nuclear energy production and increase its renewable energy supply, Germany has become a hot topic of international debate, and now the focus of the coming 2012 Symposium!
Our project, “Germany: The Rise After the Fall” has emerged from many long weeks of brainstorming and research (and already one meeting that reached nearly midnight!). Our research will focus on contemporary German politics and culture since reunification in 1990 to the present and beyond.
Join us as we work toward planning and organizing the Germany Symposium!
We are all looking forward to a challenging, yet exciting year ahead of us!
