Placement at the Dylan Thomas Boathouse Museum

This short writing aims at introducing my completed internship in the Literary Industry. I accomplished my practical training in the Dylan Thomas Boathouse in Laugharne, Wales between the 27th July and the 21st September in 2015. This opportunity was offered by the English Seminar. With meeting the requirements of the Colloquium to Literary Heritage: Preparing for the Internships in the module framework of M.EP.12b Literature in (Public) Use: Inside Views successfully, I had the chance to choose among various placements in the Literary Industry inside and outside of the borders of Germany in order to complete my obligatory practical training. I opted for the Dylan Thomas heritage in Wales primarily because of my previous knowledge of and favour to the writer's work. Ultimately, this experience in literary museology appears as a key competence under my courses in Comparative Studies.
I started my internship with a field study. I went to the most important literary centres in Wales preserving and sharing the writer's work, like Swansea, Aberystwyth, and the local buildings in the township of Laugharne. Broadening my bibliographic knowledge on these one-day study trips was a corner pillar in the successful completion of my everyday work. Secondly, I carried out two major projects during the eight weeks: setting up and keeping thorough visitor statistics and building up an electronic archive of the authentic furniture displayed in the Boathouse. The latter task turned out to be a huge undertaking, since later on I extended the system also to the written medium collections and artefacts. Thirdly, I carried out other smaller projects, like making a plan for a new film in the audiovisual room, performing various tasks in the central office in The Gate Craft Centre in St. Clears, as well as in the Boathouse.
The work experience I gathered during the eight-week practical training is a huge benefit for my future carrier. It is essential to mention that beyond the professional museological experience, I richly benefited from living and working in the Welsh cultural milieu, moreover, taking part in intercultural communication being a Hungarian student from a German university. It was an invaluable direct contact to the Welsh governmental politics and its realisation on the level of council administration, the economy, the educational system, as well as, the local mentality, the art, and craft culture. It deepened my professional and soft skills, strengthened my confidence in intercultural discourse, and resulted in a well-established co-operation between the two institutions of the University of Göttingen and the Boathouse.