Apply to participate in the History Textbook Workshop
Are you enthusiastic about history and aged between 14 and 25? Join our History Textbook Workshop to learn more about how and by whom history is written. In interactive online sessions, you will engage with history textbooks from different parts of the world and develop core skills, from source criticism to understanding the uses of history in political narratives. Whether you want to become a historian yourself or are a passionate learner, this course might be for you.
The History Textbook Workshop is an online course for participants aged 14-25. It will run weekly from mid-February to the end of May 2026. Teaching will take place in a small group led by an experienced academic historian, supported by a range of experts including teachers, public historians, and practitioners.
The course will consist of interactive and collaborative sessions all circling around History Textbooks. Convened by Dr. Anna Adashinskaya, a group of 12 participants will engage with weekly inputs by experts coming from different national and methodological traditions of learning and teaching history.
The participants to the workshop will co-create a collective online publication. After successful completion, all participants will receive a certificate indicating 3 ECTS credit points jointly issued by the BA-Program of the History Department at Zurich University, the University of New Europe and Off University.
We are looking for participants who are…
- between 14 and 25 years old
- fluent enough in English to communicate in a group with other non-native speakers
- enthusiastic about history in different forms, whether as future historians, educators, or passionate learners
- who can commit to participate weekly in the history textbook workshop between February 18th and May 28th at 4-6pm CET for fourteen 90-minute online sessions in total
- who are interested to co-create a critique of a history textbook and make it available to others
You will learn to…
- look at your textbook in a new way by seeing it as only one of many possible ways to access knowledge about the past
- understand how and by whom history is written and re-written
- analyse how historical narratives shape political alignments and identities
- compare different perspectives on the same historical events
- listen and communicate effectively and empathetically in an international community of students
Application Process
To apply, please fill in the questionnaire until January 20th, 2026, at 23:59 CET. 12 participants will be selected and notified about the outcome of their application until January 26th, 2026.
Please answer the questionnaire here.
Course Convenor
Anna Adashinskaya
Anna Adashinskaya is a historian of Byzantium and Slavic Balkan states. After receiving her PhD in Medieval Studies from Central European University, she has held research and teaching positions at the Higher School of Economics (quitted in 2022), the Centre for Anatolian Civilizations at Koç University, the Leibniz Institute for European History, and the University of Fribourg, where she has engaged with medieval history in close dialogue with its modern interpretations and narratives.
Her postdoctoral research has explored such topics as female patronage in Epirus, votive portraiture in Moldavia, and Byzantine art not only as a historical source but also as a form of historiographic discourse. She has worked on commemorative practices in medieval Southeastern Europe, with attention to how memory, power, and piety are narrated. Currently, she studies commemorative techniques in the early Ottoman Balkans, while critically reflecting on how such themes are framed in scholarly writing and history textbooks.
