(Stand: 09/2023)

• The digital archive of the Frobenius Institute for Cultural Anthropological Research contains a large ethnographic collection and a variety of databases (including, for example, an ethnographic image archive, the Ethiopia database, films, and photographs from various research and expedition contexts). Some materials are available as digital copiesDigital data are created through digitalization, which involves converting analog materials into formats suitable for electronic storage on digital media. Digital data offer the advantage of being easily and accurately duplicated, shared, and machine-processed. Read More, while others only provide metadata/descriptive data for research.
• Additionally, the collection includes images of material cultural assets, artifacts, art, and architecture from all continents, with a regional focus on Africa, which were collected by the institute’s staff during research stays in the first half of the 20th century.
• The analog use of originals is regulated exclusively through a user agreement, which can be arranged if the user resides in Frankfurt am Main and is affiliated with a scientific institution.
• Copies of images and photos can be ordered for a fee and are available as publication-ready digital files, data DVDs and interpositive reproductions. Prices vary depending on content and density, ranging between €7 and €36. Special conditions can be negotiated for larger orders.
• The „Written Legacies“ refer to the written legacies of anthropologists Eike Haberland, Adolf Jensen, and Helmut Straube, who conducted research in southern Ethiopia between 1935 and 1994. They include archived data such as letters, notebooks, reports, and unpublished ethnographies regarding communities and ways of life in southern Ethiopia before social upheavals and cultural changes occurred around 1980.
• Thus, the archived data could be used, for example, for a historical comparative study of the same regions then and now (2023), focusing on historical, political, or religious aspects. Possible research questions could include:
  • What role does the proselytism that took place in southern Ethiopia in the 1960s play in religious life today?
  • What impact did the socialist years (1974-1987) in southern Ethiopia have on the current political situation?
  • How did the social position of women change between 1960 and 1980, and what role did political and social upheavals in southern Ethiopia play in this process?
• Other research ideas concerning the archived data could include: Image and media analysis with a specific research question on a (historical) aspect, or decolonial or postcolonial perspectives on the research stays of Frobenius, Haberland, Jensen, and Straube and their work in southern Ethiopia in the early 20th century.