Welcome

search database [Dutch only, an English version is being prepared]

The ODIS project, that is the Research Interface Centre and Database for the Study of 19th and 20th Century Intermediary Structures in Flanders (Onderzoekssteunpunt en databank intermediaire structuren in Vlaanderen, 19e-20e eeuw [ODIS]) fosters interest in interdisciplinary and comparative research on civil society. It aims to promote mutual dialogue between historians, social scientists, archivists, librarians and documentation specialists.

The project also develops research tools. The ODIS database, a user-friendly web database in a reliable technical setting, became operational in September 2001. This is a contextual database, the first in Flanders, and offers a location in which the numerous and dispersed files, research tools and collections on the subject can be centralised, correlated and updated.

The database offers a wide range of possible uses (encyclopaedic, analytic, …). An intensive input of data and the conversion of older series of data meant that in November 2003 a coherent and extensive dataset could be made available in this website’s public catalogue.

Given that ODIS is a dynamic research tool, the data series will be further supplemented, updated and extended by the host institutions during the coming years. They welcome additional partners wishing to contribute to the data series. Individual users of the ODIS database are also invited to submit additions and any necessary corrections.

An ODIS index card always ends with a cross-reference conforming to the relevant international norms. Those wishing to refer to the index cards in the ODIS database are kindly asked to use this cross-reference.

search database [Dutch only, an English version is being prepared]