This workshop positions inquiry-based learning not merely as pedagogy but as an epistemic practice within memory studies. We ask how encounters with primary sources from the state-socialist, non-democratic past catalyze “lifeworld” connections—self-referential, locally situated, and present-oriented forms of uptake that matter for democratic memory. Building on a relevant subset of student outputs from HistoryLab.cz (n≈6,000) and a comparative Visegrad lens informed by Making Visegrad History Digital, we translate these concerns into a model.
Conceptually, we treat the classroom as an infrastructural site of memory where interpretive schemas are rehearsed, stabilized, or contested. Methodologically, we operationalize lifeworld connection via a concise rubric (linking self/family, locality, everyday practice, present analogies, moral-economy reasoning) and introduce a human-in-the-loop GenAI rater as a heuristic, not an oracle, to scale formative judgments while preserving scholarly control. The session demonstrates how intersubjective validation (human–model comparison, error analysis, prompt transparency, and ethical redaction of PII) can yield defensible indicators of engagement without reducing complexity or relying only on sentiments.
Participants will leave with a principled framework for identifying which inquiry configurations are most likely to elicit lifeworld connection, and with criteria for assessing their transferability beyond the Czech context. More broadly, the workshop argues that carefully designed inquiries with primary sources—augmented, not replaced, by GenAI—can foster plural, reflexive forms of remembrance aligned with the normative project of democratic memory.
20260730T154520260730T1715America/Argentina/Buenos_AiresWORKSHOP: Lifeworld Connection through Inquiry: Primary Sources, Democratic Memory, and a Human-in-the-Loop GenAI HeuristicSV404 (ART)MSA Buenos Aires 2026buenosairesconference@memorystudiesassociation.org
