User:Dan MorCo/sandbox

Aline Sierp, born 13 March 1982, is a German tenured Assistant Professor in European Studies and a researcher at Maastricht University. She is also the co-founder and co-president of the Memory Studies Association and the Council of European Studies’ Research Network on Transnational Memory and Identity in Europe. Her research interests revolve around collective memory, questions of identity and European integration.

Biography

Personal life

Aline Sierp was born on March 13, 1982, in Bonn, Germany. Through her life, Sierp has lived in several European countries, firstly because of her studies, and later because of her work. Currently, Sierp’s work is based in Maastricht, the Netherlands, where she is employed as a tenured assistant professor at Maastricht University.

In 2021, Sierp spoke out about the challenges of working in academia as a parent during the COVID-19 pandemic. In an interview published in The Observant, an independent university newspaper, Sierp contemplated the negative effects of assessing academics by largely focussing on their number of publications, and voiced concerns about whether the reasons for gaps in research-output would be considered.

Education

In 2002, Sierp went to pursue an undergraduate degree at the University of Reading in Reading, Berkshire, England. She graduated with honors with a Bachelor in European Studies and Foreign Languages in 2006.

She proceeded to earn a Master of Arts degree in Contemporary European Studies, with distinction, which was jointly awarded in 2007 by the University of Bath (the United Kingdom), the Paris Institute of Political Studies (France), and the University of Siena (Italy). Sierp completed the degree with her master thesis titled ‘Shared history, divided memory? Vergangenheitsbewältigung in Italy and Germany'.

In the following years, Sierp continued her studies at the University of Siena. In 2008, she obtained the degree Master of Research in European and Comparative Politics from the university, and continued by pursuing a PhD. Through this time, Sierp produced her PhD thesis, ‘Constructing the Past - Shaping the Future: From a National to a European Memory, which she completed and graduated summa cum laude in 2011.

Throughout her academic career, Sierp’s work has been focused on collective memory after experiences of human rights violations and identity in the context of Europeanv integration.

Academic Career

During her studies Sierp completed Traineeships at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, the United Nations in Turin and the German Embassy in Rome. Sierp worked as course assistant in the Euromasters programme at the University of Sienna during her PhD. After achieving her PhD, she worked from 2011-2012 as Researcher in the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site in Dachau, Germany. There, Sierp worked in human rights education in the international office. In 2012, Sierp started teaching at Maastricht University as lecturer in European Studies where Sierp became 2014 Assistant Professor in European Studies.

Sierp is co-founder and co-president of the Memory Studies Association. The Memory Studies Association unites Memory Studies scholars from various disciplines and those who work in museums, memorial institutions, archives and other fields, and aims to become the most important forum in the memory field through its annual conference and online presence. Currently Sierp and the Memory Studies Association work together with EuroClio on the Contested Histories Onsite Project. Additionally, Sierp was co-chair and co-founder of the Council of European Studies´ Research Network on Transnational Memory and Identity in Europe. Sierp is also co-editor of the Berghahn Books Series Worlds of Memory.

Sierp held visiting fellowships at the European University Institute in Fiesole, Italy, and at the Institut d’Anàlisi Econòmica (CSIC) in Madrid. Furthermore, Sierp was a guest lecturer at College of Europe, Johns Hopkins University SAIS in Bologna, Ben Gurion University in Israel, Utrecht University, the Central European University, the Primo Levi Centre in New York, Universidad de Sevilla, the University of Padova, the University of Minnesota, the University of Siena, Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, the University of Melbourne and the University of Birmingham. Additionally, Sierp is Member of the MA European Studies Programme Committee at Maastricht University.

Sierps expertise revolves around collective memory, European memory and Identity politics, European integration History and post-1945 German and Italian History. Most of Sierps publications revolve around memory and identity such as History, Memory and Transeuropean Identity: Unifying Divisions or Agency in Transnational Memory Politics. In her field of research, Sierp has participated and organized several conferences, workshops and was a keynote speaker.

Publications

• Sierp, A. (2008). Minority Language Protection in Italy. Linguistic minorities and the Media. Journal of Contemporary European Research, 4(4), 303-321. https://www.jcer.net/index.php/jcer/article/view/120

• Sierp, A. (2009). Nostalgia for Times Past. On the Uses and Abuses of the Ostalgie Phenomenon in Eastern Germany. Contemporary European Studies, 4(2), 47-60.
• Sierp, A. (2010). A question of impact – EU citizenship without citizens? Open Citizenship, 1(1), 6-27.
• Sierp, A. (2012). Italy's struggle with history and the europeanisation of national memory. In U. Engel, M. Middell, & S. Troebst (Eds.), Erinnerungskulturen in transnationaler Perspektive Leipziger Universitätsverlag.
• Sierp, A. (2014). The end of the memory war? From a national to a European memory framework. In O. Gyafarsova, & K. Liebhart (Eds.), Constructing and Communicating EUrope (pp. 147-171). LIT Verlag.
• Sierp, A. (2014). Integrating Europe - integrating memories. The EU’s politics of memory since 1945. In L. Bond, & J. Rapson (Eds.), The Transcultural Turn: Interrogating Memory between and beyond borders De Gruyter.
• Sierp, A. (2014). History, Memory, and Trans-European Identity: Unifying Divisions. Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group. https://www.routledge.com/History-Memory-and-Trans-European-Identity-Unifying-Divisions/Sierp/p/book/9781138786936
• Sierp, A., & Wuestenberg, J. (2015). Transnational Memory Politics in Europe. Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 23(3). http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cjea20/23/3
• Sierp, A. (2015). Quale verità è quella vera? Commemorazione pubblica della seconda guerra mondiale in Italia. In Conflitti della memoria/Memoria dei conflitti. Modelli narrativi della memoria intergenerazionale in Italia e Spagna. Museum Tusculanum Press.
• Sierp, A., & Wuestenberg, J. (2015). Linking the local and the transnational: Rethinking memory politics in Europe. Journal of Contemporary European Studies, 23(3), 321-329. https://doi.org/10.1080/14782804.2015.1058244
• Sierp, A. (2015). Democratic Change in Central and Eastern Europe 1989-90. European Parliament. European Parliament History Series http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2015/538881/EPRS_STU(2015)538881_REV1_EN.pdf
• Sierp, A. (2016). Memory, Identity and a Painful Past: Contesting the Former Dachau Concentration Camp. In M. Starzmann, & J. Roby (Eds.), Excavating Memory: Sites of Remembering and Forgetting (pp. 316-335). University Press of Florida.
• Sierp, A. (2016). Drawing Lessons from the Past: Mapping Change in Central and South-Eastern Europe. East European Politics and Societies, 30(1), 3-9. https://doi.org/10.1177/0888325415605890
• Olick, J. K., Sierp, A., & Wüstenberg, J. (2017). The Memory Studies Association: Ambitions and an invitation. Memory Studies, 10(4), 490-494. https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698017721792
• Sierp, A., & Karner, C. (2017). National stereotypes in the context of the European crisis. National Identities, 19(1), 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1080/14608944.2016.1209646
• Sierp, A., & Karner, C. (Eds.) (2017). Dividing united Europe. Stereotypes, prejudices and the European (economic) crisis. National Identities, 19(1). http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cnid20/19/1
• Sierp, A. (2017). Book Review: Hoerber, T (2014). A Converging Post-War European Discourse: War Experience, Changing Security Concepts, and Research and Education. Journal of Common Market Studies, 55(1), 153-154. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcms.12492
• Sierp, A. (2017). 1939 versus 1989 – A Missed Opportunity to Create a European Lieu de Mémoire? East European Politics and Societies, 31(3), 439-455. https://doi.org/10.1177/0888325417697791
• Sierp, A. (2018). Entre el debate y el diálogo: La Unión Europea como mediadora de memoria. IC: revista cientifica de informacion y comunicacion, 15, 29-55. https://doi.org/10.12795/IC.2018.i01.01
• Sierp, A. (2018). Book Review: Speccher, T. (2016). Die Darstellung des Holocausts in Italien und Deutschland. Erinnerungsarchitektur – Politischer Diskurs – Ethik. Bielefeld: Transcript. Quest. Issues in Contemporary Jewish History , (13), 211-213.
• Olick, J. K., Sierp, A., & Wustenberg, J. (2019). Preface. Memory Studies, 12(1), 3-4. https://doi.org/10.1177/1750698018811975
• Sierp, A. (2019). Las Politicas Europeas de la Memoria: Un Ejemplo de Conflicto Productivo? In J. G. i Coromines, J. A. Carballés, & R. C. Sánchez (Eds.), Diez años de leyes y políticas de memoria (2007-2017) Catarata. Investigación y Debate No. 243 https://www.catarata.org/libro/diez-anos-de-leyes-y-politicas-de-memoria-2007-2017_89373/
• Sierp, A., & Karner, C. (Eds.) (2019). Dividing United Europe. From Crisis to Fragmentation? Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group.
• Sierp, A. (2020). The European Union as a Memory Region. Contemporanea, 23(1), 128-132 . https://doi.org/10.1409/96382
• Capdepon, U., Sierp, A., & Strauss, J. (Eds.) (2020). Introduction: Museums and Monuments: Memorials of Violent Pasts in Urban Spaces. History & Memory, 32(1), 5-8. https://doi.org/10.2979/histmemo.32.1.02
• Sierp, A. (2020). EU Memory Politics and Europe’s Forgotten Colonial Past. Interventions-International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 22(6), 686-702. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369801X.2020.1749701
• Sierp, A., & Wüstenberg, J. (Eds.) (2020). Agency in Transnational Memory Politics. Berghahn.
• Sierp, A. (2020). A Contested Latecomer: The Munich Documentation Center for the History of National Socialism. History & Memory, 32(1), 9-33. https://doi.org/10.2979/histmemo.32.1.03
• Sierp, A. (2021). Memory Studies – Development, Debates and Directions. In M. Berek, K. Chmelar, O. Dimbath, H. Haag, M. Heinlein, N. Leonhard, V. Rauer, & G. Sebald (Eds.), Handbuch Sozialwissenschaftliche Gedächtnisforschung Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-26593-9_42-1
• Sierp, A., & Ortiz Cabrero, L. (2021). Acting at the margins: Italian mnemonic activism in the European Parliament. Politique Européenne, 71(1), 110-141. https://doi.org/10.3917/poeu.071.0110