Diane Scherzler

Journalistic contributions

In this section, you can find a selection of Diane Scherzler's texts and broadcastings she made for the websites as well as the TV and radio programmes of the ARD.

Trading illicit antiquities
The multi-billion dollar business with the past
Archaeologists are searching for any details that help us to better understand our ancestors' lives. Looters, however, are interested in short term money: The illicit trade with archaeological objects is organized like drugs and arms trade.
swr.de, January 2012 (German)

Picture gallery "Of destruction, terrorism and policital signals. Illicit digging and its consequences"
swr.de, January 2012 (German)

Astronomy
Stardust and remote galaxies
Stellar nurseries, clouds of dust around red supergiant stars, distant galaxies: the Hubble Space Telescope is observing our universe for 20 years. Look at Hubble's most stunning images.
swr.de, April 2010 (German)

How the interconnected world is changing us
Friendship 2.0
Rapidly our communication behaviour is changing: We communicate by e-mail, SMS, social media, or Skype. Our cell phone seduces us to be within reach at anytime. We get information within seconds in the internet. Our children who are born in the digital age already regard e-mail and cell-phone as antiquated. And some people feel quite uneasy when they are offline or have to turn-off their cell-phone.
TV channel EinsPlus "leben!", 20 April 2010, 8.15 until 9 PM (Editor of the broadcast)

On the 450th anniversary of Philipp Melanchton's death
"Do invest in education!"
Although it is mainly Martin Luther who is associated with reformation: Without his friend Philipp Melanchthon this time would certainly have been less successful. Melanchton lived and worked in Wittenberg. There he died 450 years ago.
swr.de, April 2010 (German)

"The Song of the Nibelungs" in Karlsruhe
A masterpiece of world literature
One of the world's most precious books is kept in Karlsruhe: The Nibelungenlied, the Song
of the Nibelungs. This saga that tells of Siegfried, the dragon-slyer, has now been declared as
World Heritage by the UNESCO.
swr.de, January 2010 (German)

The Kaiowá people in Brazil
In search of the "land without evil"
For centuries Brazil's Kaiowá people are searching for a place that is their paradise on Earth. Their destiny is portrayed in the motion picture "Birdwatchers". In an interview ethnologist Mark Muenzel told us about the real life of these Native Americans.
swr.de, July 2009 (German)

Palaeolithic art
The earliest art pieces of mankind
Southern Germany 35.000 years ago: As hunters and gatherers men wandered the land. They used ivory for depicting the animals they observed: mammoths, wild horses, birds. The small sculptures are art pieces of perfect beauty. Moreover, researchers discovered flutes made of animal bones and the figurine of a woman.
swr.de, June 2009 (German)

Picture gallery "Fragile treasures - Palaeolithic art pieces from the
Swabian mountains"
swr.de, June 2009 (German)

100 years ago: The discovery of Homo heidelbergensis
Almost a man
600.000 years ago in southern Germany were living rhinoceroses, crocodiles and forest elephants. A lower jaw that was found 100 years ago in Mauer near Heidelberg witnesses that also first men lived there at that time.
swr.de, October 2008 (German)

The Neolithic Revolution
A turning point of mankind
To live in houses and to buy food in the supermarket seems natural for us. But 99% of the time since men exist we lived as hunters and gatherers. When our ancestors settled down, it was probably the most serious decision mankind ever made.
SWR major theme "Stone Age - The Experiment", swr.de, May 2007 (German)

Herxheim
A palatinate stone age ceremonial site
Men came from far away to Herxheim 7.000 years ago. They carried the mortal remains of much more than 450 persons and cut them up during a ritual. Archaeologists are investigating the unique site.
swr.de, November 2006 (German)

The Neanderthals
The highly specialised man
He could hear whether the wind blew through a fir or through a pine tree, and whether a doe or a buck was moving in the bushes. The Neanderthals had several advantages over us. Why did thy die out nevertheless? An interview with the paleo-anthropologist Dr. Alfred Czarnetzki.
swr2.de, February 2006 (German)

"We Are Still Here!":
The National Museum of the American Indian
The newest flagship of the world-famous Smithsonian institution is not a museum about Native Americans: The original inhabitants of the American continent are presenting their cultures themselves. For many of them the museum is a mark of hope und an important symbol that they survived a genocide.
Half-hour radio feature for SWR2, February 2005 (German)

The Society of St Pius X
"An important study time on fundamentalism"
About 400 priests belong to the Society of St Pius X. This ultraconservative group hit the headlines again and again, for example with Holocaust denier Richard Williamson. Filmmaker Günther B. Ginzel stayed and shooted over nine months amongst the society's member's. In an interview he tell about their life behind the scences.
swr.de, January 2011 (German), offline

Hans Holbein's "The Grey Passion"
The power of the colour grey
More than 13 million Euro were paid for the twelve panels of Hans Holbein the Elder’s "The Grey Passion". It took more than two years to thoroughly restore the 500 years old work. The unusual and impressive altar painting is now on display in Stuttgart's Alte Staatsgalerie.
swr.de, November 2010 (German), offline

Living History
Bold knights and brave warriors
Knights' tournaments, Celtic way of life and medieval festivals: Living History, an entertaining interpretation of the past, is booming. What drives people to spend their leisure time als Celts, and what about the "truth content" of those shows?
swr.de, May 2010 (German, offline)

Wild herbs
Experience makes perfect
Wild herbs and plants enrich the menu as well as the medicine chest. What one must be aware of when collecting such plants the expert Annegret Müller-Bächtle told us on a hiking tour near Stuttgart.
swr.de, April 2010 (German), offline

Speleology
Dry-shod to the "Moerike dome"
Myths and fairy tales surround the Blautopf near Blaubeuren. Until now the lake with the amazingly blue color was the only, dangerous route for researchers to dive to a huge cave system in the Swabian Jura. Now a dry access exists - drilled through 17 metres of rock.
swr.de, April 2010 (German), offline

Volunteering
Make the world a better place - on vacation
Protecting the lynx's habitat in the Palatinate Forest, working on remote farms of Tyrolean mountain famers, or supporting scientists in researching rare turtles: More and more people help during their vacation to make the world a better place.
swr.de, March 2010 (German), offline

"Ice Age"exhibition in Stuttgart
Buxom, gracile, gorgeous - Treasures of the Ice Age
A Venus figurine, a wild horse, and other treasures: The oldest known art pieces of mankind were found in four caves in the the Swabian mountains. Now they can be admired in the major exhibtion "Ice Age - Art and Culture" in Stuttgart until 10 January.
swr.de, September 2009 (German), offline

Swabian Mountains
Farmer with passion
Ernst Voehringer works 60 to 80 hours per week. The farmer never takes a vacation, he uses all
his money on keeping his farm running. Even though he doesn't want to be an organic farmer,
the Swabian deliberately renounces maximum crops. To give up is something he doesn't even have in mind.
swr.de, June 2009 (German), offline

Two exhibitions about beauty
Mirror, mirror on the wall ...
To be beautiful, young and fit is a major ideal of our time. Two very different exhibitions in Karlsruhe and Trier were dealing with the topic. It becomes clear that our idea of beauty is a very relative one.
swr.de, March 2009 (German), offline

Astronomy
Fascinating view into outer space
Flamboyant yellow vapour of gas, clouds of a supernova that happened a long time ago, spiral galaxies in unimaginable distances: The images of the Hubble Space Telescope make the viewer be speechless with amazement. The telescope has fundamentally advanced research, too, narrates science journalist Uwe Gradwohl in an interview.
swr.de, December 2008 (German), offline

Exhibition about Homer in Mannheim
The father of European poetry
Homer lived more than 2.500 years ago, but his stories of dauntless heroes, teasingly beautiful women and grand adventurers are unforgotten. An exhibition in Mannheim deals with the famous poet until 18 January 2009.
swr.de, September 2008 (German), offline

Aerospace
Space Shuttles: Triumphs and tragedies
On April 12th 1981 the maiden flight of the first Space Shuttle took place. "Columbia" was a reusable spaceship. Until then rockets were used, of which only the capsule with the crew came back to Earth.
swr.de, August 2008 (German), offline

Large mummy exhibition in Mannheim
A body for eternity
With great efforts men prepared their dead, for they could get bodily intact to the beyond. The exhibition "Mummies - The Dream of Eternal Life" showed that mummification exists everywhere and at all times.
swr.de, September 2007 (German), offline

The cradle of our civilization
The exhibition "12.000 years ago in Anatolia"
Large cities, space exploration, or books – basically our whole culture – would not exist, if men had not settled down. A major exhibition in Karlsruhe is concerned with these origins of our civilization 12.000 years ago.
swr.de, January 2007 (German), offline

Climate change
"Every single one can play an active part"
Silt avalanches in the Alps, drought in Eastern Germany and high water of the Rhine: This could be daily routine in Germany in the year 2100. But not inevitably, says the climate expert Dr. Benno Hain of the Federal Environment Agency.
swr.de, August 2006 (German), offline

Climate change
Help to save the world
It seems impossible to slow down or even to stop global warming. But if you move off ten minutes earlier in the morning, or if you throw a switch, you can already effect a lot as individual.
swr.de, August 2006 (German), offline

Pharmacy
Why does the concession of new cancer pharmaceutical take so long?
The development of a pharmaceutical for the cure of cancer lasts twelve years on average, the actual concession about 18 months. For patients who are desperately waiting for salvation this seems to be endless. But the procedure is intended to secure the pharmaceutical's quality.
ARD's core theme week "To live - what else?" ard.de, April 2006 (German), offline

Clinical trials
An additional chance of cure
A new cancer drug could decide on life and death, but its development takes a very long time. For cancer-sufferers it could be worthwhile to participate in a pharmaceutical study and to test a drug which is not yet licensed.
ARD's core theme week "To live - what else?" swr.de, April 2006 (German), offline

Archaeological discovery close to Heuneburg
The child with golden jewellery
Precious pendants and brooches made from gold: When the young girl died 2.500 years ago her wealthy parents put true valuables in the child's grave. Only by fortunate coincidence archaeologists were able to find it.
swr.de, December 2005 (German), offline

Haigerloch
"Geheime Reichssache" (state secret document) in the rock's basement
To protect them from attacks the vehicles had been driving only at night and with switched-off lights. Now they are stopping ahead of an unimposing cave below Haigerloch's castle. Men are pulling off the freight of the trucks inside the cave as fast as possible. Nobody must know what is going to happen here. - It is the beginning of 1945, and in Haigerloch the last efforts of the perishing Nazi Reich are starting to put a nuclear reactor into operation.
swr.de, March 2004 (German), offline

Reutlingen
"Nobody was alone in Gmindersdorf"
1.000 workers and employees lived together with their families in Gmindersdorf. This working-class estate was founded in 1903 by the Ulrich Gminder Ltd., at that time a significant European textile company. The Gmindersdorf in Reutlingen was trend-setting for entire Germany. Architecturally and socio-politically it was a model settlement with state-of-the-art infrastructure.
swr.de, January 2004 (German), offline

Liberia
"It doesn't make sense, only to pump money into it"
August 2003: The dimension of misery in Liberia is huge. The United Nations estimate the number of humans in hardship at 1,3 millions - only in Monrovia. There is acute danger of epidemic plagues. The suffering in Liberia's hinterland is hardly known at the moment. The world association Caritas stays in Monrovia since August 15. Interview with Frank Ballot, Caritas' specialist for West Africa.
tagesschau.de, August 2003 (German), offline

Baghdad
Archaeology, Iraq, and the mass media
When the Iraqi National Museum in Baghdad was looted in spring 2003, this made a noise in the world. But hardly anyone learned, that the US-American and British military later also took the pillaging of archaeological sites lying down.
Diane Scherzler was interviewed as expert for archaeology in the radio programme
SWR2, July 2003 (German), offline

The pillaging of Iraq's cultural assets swr2.de, July 2003 (German), offline

"They are lost for ever": Interview with the Lebanese Archaeologist Joanne Farchakh
swr2.de, July 2003 (German), offline

Gateway to Eldorado
Archaeologists from Tuebingen are excavating in Panama
Today, only ruins are visible of Panamá la Vieja. Once, the town was the first settlement, which the Spanish conquistadores erected at the Pacific coast of the American continent in the 16th century. Panamá served as important reloading point of Gold coming from Peru with destination Spain. Spaniards, African slaves, and the indigenous Native Americans encountered there. The British pirate Henry Morgan burned the town down 152 years after its foundation. Medieval archaeologists from Tuebingen investigated how people lived in Panamá la Vieja.
swr.de, May 2003 (German), offline

From Nebukadnezar to Saddam Hussein
The power of the past
Saddam Hussein loved to be a celebrated person. Permanent feature of the way he presented himself was to align himself with the major rulers of the past: Nebuchadnezzar, Hammurabi, Saladin or Haroun al-Rashid. Independently of his vain self-adulation, the remembrance of a common past could, however, be very important for Iraq's rebuilding. Namely it could create a collective awareness which unites the different ethnical and religious groups in Iraq and which prevents the country from breaking up. This thinks Eckart Frahm, assyriologist at the university of Yale.
swr.de, April 2003 (German), offline