SoNAR (IDH) – Interfaces to Data for Historical Social Network Analysis and Research. Proposal for the examination and demonstration of a e-Research-Technology for Historical Network Analysis.

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Marian Dörk; Professor Dr. Heiner Fangerau; Professorin Vivien Petras, Ph.D.; Dr. Georg Rehm; Barbara Schneider-Kempf
• Subject Area: Empirical Social Research ; Modern and Contemporary History ; History of Science
• Term: from 2019 to 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 414792379

SoNAR (IDH) elaborates systematically, application-oriented best practice-approaches for the development of an integrated e-Research-Technology. It involves the examination of historical networks with methods of the Social Network Analysis (SNA). The technology is based on dispersed data repositories compliant with library and archival metadata standards as well as connected with authority files for entity identification.Gradually, the project will develop a prototype to demonstrate economic and technical validity of integrated technical components and elaborates a concept for a sustainable implementation and maintenance of the e-Research-Technology. To achieve its objectives, the project is subdivided to work on six topics: (1) Data preparation: The original data (meta- and authority records, full texts) of dispersed data repositories will be processed for statistical analysis. It includes tools to identify and link entities in full texts with authority records. (2) Data management: Access to the prepared data will comply with scientific requirements for quantitative analysis: reproducibility, persistent identification, and verification of data (provenance). (3) Exemplary research design: It lays the foundation for a solid service portfolio of the research technology for a structured social network analysis, and thus to integrate SoNAR (IDH) into theresearch process. (4) Visualization and interface design: The project will develop new innovative and intuitive concepts for displaying and interacting with (multimodal) graphs in a web-based environment. The topics (5) evaluation and (6) concept for implementation and maintenance will support quality and sustainability of the research technology. SoNAR (IDH) will support future historical research by providing aunified and simplified access to statistical data for historical networks.

• DFG Programme: Research data and software (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)
• International Connection: France, Luxembourg, USA
• Cooperation Partners: Professorin Dr. Anne Baillot; Dr. Marten Düring; Daniel Pitti