Eike-Christian Heine

About me

I am a historian working at the intersection of environmental history with the history of science and technology. I joined the Greenhouse and the University of Stavanger in November 2024.

I studied political science, modern history and philosophy at the Technical University of Braunschweig. In Braunschweig I also completed my PhD in history, which I defended in 2013 and published in 2015 (Das große Graben. Die Geschichte des Nord-Ostsee-Kanals, Kadmos). After that, I worked as a postdoc at the Technical University of Braunschweig, the University of Stuttgart and the University of the Bundeswehr in Munich. I received a two-year research fellowship from the Gerda Henkel Foundation and was a Scholar in Residence at the Research Institute of the Deutsches Museum in Munich for six months. I have received travel grants from the D.A.A.D. and the Max Weber Foundation. I am the founder and Principal Investigator of the research network Modern Expedition which is funded by the German Research Foundation DFG. I do the podcast Extreme Environments which I will be relaunching in the coming months.

My research

In Stavanger I am a postdoc in the Pitch Project. Here I analyze the role of Petroculture in the exhibition practices of European technology museums and industrial heritage sites. Together with curator Dr. Nora Thora, I am also curating a museal intervention at the Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin to critically examine the historical role of technology in our contemporary fossil culture.

My other research interests include the history of infrastructure, the history of fieldwork in colonial settings, the history of archaeology, and the history of work and exploration in extreme environments, particularly underwater.

MONOGRAPHS 

• Vom großen Graben. Die Geschichte des Nord-Ostsee-Kanals. Berlin: Kadmos 2015. (Dissertation)
• with Matthias Dudde: Volkswagen Financial Services AG. Bank, leasing, insurance. A chronicle of 60 years of Financial Services. Wolfsburg: Volkswagen 2009 (in German: Volkswagen Financial Services AG. 60 Jahre Bank, Leasing, Versicherung – eine Chronik).

Edited Volumes & Special Issues

• with Martin Meiske (ed.): Beyond the Lab and the Field. Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 2022. 
• with Christoph Rauhut (ed.): Producing non-simultaneity. Construction sites as places of progressiveness and continuity. London: Routledge 2018.
• As special issue editor: Technik, Techniker und Verantwortung. In: Technikgeschichte 83 (2016), 4. 
• As editor: Under construction. Construction sites: Building the material and the imagined world. Berlin: LIT 2016.

Peer Reviewed Articles & Book Chapters

• with Martin Meiske: “Scientific Bonanzas. Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production.” In: Eike-Christian Heine, Martin Meiske (ed.): Beyond the Lab and the Field. Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 2022, 3–20. 
• “Autobahn and archaeology. Intersections of infrastructure, knowledge and ideology in the Third Reich.” In: Eike-Christian Heine, Martin Meiske (ed.): Beyond the Lab and the Field. Infrastructures as Places of Knowledge Production. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press 2022, 101–121. 
• “Forschen in einer extremen Umwelt. Praktiken unterwasserarchäologischer Feldforschung am Kap Gelidonya (1958–1961).” In: NTM – Zeitschrift für die Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin 29 (2021), 171–202.
• with Christian Zumbrägel: “Technikgeschichte,” Version: 1.0, in: Docupedia-Zeitgeschichte, 20.12.2018, http://docupedia.de/zg/Heine_zumbraegel_technikgeschichte_v1_de_2018.
• “Die technisierten Körper der Erdarbeiter um 1900.” In: Body Politics 6 (2018), 323–352.
• “Two canals, two barrages and the remnants of a river. Nature and technology along the Eider, Schleswig-Holstein's longest river.” In: Environment and History 23 (2017), 253–283. 
• “Jenseits von Kultur und Zivilisation. Vereinzelte moralische Ansprüche an Technik und Techniker im ersten Drittel des 20. Jahrhunderts.” In: Technikgeschichte 83 (2016) 4, 265–286.
• “Connect and Divide. On the history of the Kiel Canal.” In: Journal of Transport History 35 (2014), 200–219.
• “Die aufsässigen Elemente. Herausforderungen, Technik und Arbeiter beim Bau des Nord-Ostsee-Kanals.” In: Technikgeschichte 81 (2014), 305–334.

Articles & Book chapters (incomplete)

• “’To its total lack of respect for all things majestic.’ Menschen, Maschinen und Moral in Ian M. Banks Culture-Reihe.“ In: Stefan Zahlmann (ed.): Medien des Phantastischen (Spur der Steine, Vol. 4, ed. by Stefan Zahlmann). Wien: Bibliothek der Provinz 2021, 105–124.
• with Christian Kehrt: “Natur.” In: Martina Heßler, Kevin Liggieri (ed.): Handbuch zur Historischen Technikanthropologie. Baden-Baden: Nomos 2020, 231–235.
• with Thomas Schuetz: “Das Ende des Ersten Weltkrieges vor hundert Jahren - Technikhistorische Folgen.” In: Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin. Zeitschrift der Stiftung Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin und der Freunde und Förderer des DTMB (58) 2018, 4–9.
• “Einleitung: Technik, Techniker und Verantwortung im 20. Jahrhundert in Deutschland. Plädoyer für eine Begriffsgeschichte.” In: Technikgeschichte 83 (2016) 4, 253–264.
• with Sonja Petersen & Thomas Schuetz: “Der Erste Weltkrieg und die Technik - Technikhistorische Perspektiven.” In: Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin. Zeitschrift der Stiftung Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin und der Freunde und Förderer des DTMB e.V. 53 (2014), 4–9.
• with Bernadette Descharmes, Stefanie Mamsch & Philippa Söldenwagner: “Gefroren wird immer. Eine kleine Kulturgeschichte des Frierens von der Antike bis zur Neuzeit.” In: Christian Frey et. al. (ed.): Sinngeschichten. Kulturgeschichtliche Beiträge für Ute Daniel. Köln et. al.: Böhlau 2013, 103–117.