Die studentische Lebenswelt in Universitatsstadten der Fruhen Neuzeit ist ein bislang nicht untersuchtes Feld im Rahmen der Forschungen zur Denunziation. Holger Zaunstock erforscht und vergleicht erstmals auf empirischer Basis die Emergenz der Denunziation in mehreren Universitatsstadten zwischen dem Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts und dem Epochenumbruch im fruhen 19. Jahrhundert: Wie und warum wird Denunziationsverhalten ermoglicht, wie sind die Menschen damit umgegangen und welche Verhaltensweisen wurden entwickelt? Die Untersuchung stellt die Merkmale denunziatorischen Verhaltens in sozialen, politischen und mentalen Handlungsfeldern dar. Auf diese Weise wird ein Bild des Denunziationsverhaltens in der Fruhen Neuzeit entworfen, das zahlreiche weitergehende Anknupfungspunkte im Blick auf spatere politische Kulturen zur Verfugung stellt."

The social substratum of Enlightenment in the ancien rA(c)gime was constituted by the various Enlightenment societies. Learned and Patriotic Societies, Freemason Lodges, Reading Societies, and Secret Societies assembled aristocrats and burghers, scholars and merchants, professors and students with a hitherto unprecedented singleness of purpose. As yet there has been a signal absence of prosopographic studies on this extensive society landscape in terms of the structures displayed by this 'Fraternity of Enlighteners'. In his study the author takes the example of central German societies of this kind and embarks on a systematic analysis of those structures. How many such societies were there in the 18th century, where and when did they exist? Who were the members? Did the societies exist in mutual isolation or were they interconnected via multiple memberships and society 'careers'? Are there indications for a fully-fledged network of 'enlightened' societies?

Recently, societies have come in for increasing attention in research on the 18th century. Earlier the emphasis was on the so-called 'Enlightenment societies' but now a broader range of societalization processes have attracted the interest of humanities scholars and cultural studies experts. Common to them all is an interest in the emergence of sociability, networks and communication structures. This is reflected programmatically in the title of the volume. Studies on individual societies and their members join with analyses of personal and institutional networks to form the basis for an emergent picture of the communicative history of societalization in the 18th century.