Vienna Update No. 2: The Wien Museum

The Vienna study abroad program has just finished their second week of classes at Das Millicanhaus and are headed into their first weekend of international travel. This week, study abroad students had the opportunity to visit the Wien Museum (the Vienna Museum) and get to know the history of the city they will be calling home for the next ten weeks. According to its website:

“The Wien Museum is home to Vienna’s extraordinary collection of art works and historical artifacts… The museum’s permanent exhibition VIENNA. MY STORY offers a chronological tour of the city, from pre-history to the present day.”

Jonah Wilcox, a freshman majoring in history, is an Oklahoma Christian University student participating in the Vienna study abroad program this semester.

“The Vienna Museum is basically the city museum for all of Vienna and Austrian history,” said Wilcox. “Each floor is like a chunk of Vienna history. It starts in the Middle Ages, and goes all the way up until current times when you reach the top of the museum. They have everything from Viennese art to a little section on World War Two, just different periods of time through Vienna’s history,” Wilcox said.

While in Vienna, study abroad students are encouraged to learn more about the culture that they are living in. Students are guided through that in a structured course called cross cultural perspectives, taught by the Vienna Program Director Ashley Burklin.

“The class that we went with to the museum was the cross cultural class, which is a required class for anybody doing study abroad. It’s basically looking at the culture of Vienna and the culture of Europe in general, and how it differs, or how it’s similar to American culture. And so it’s a lot of tours and a lot of physical learning… So we’ve done a couple tours now, and we have tours planned throughout the whole rest of the semester.”

The group arrived and entered the museum all together, and from there students were able to explore the museum at their own pace to find the parts of the museum that interested them the most.

Wilcox said, “We now have to take one thing that we found interesting from the museum and turn it into a presentation for cross cultural class, which gives us a way to do some deeper research into topics that were highlighted in small quantities at the museum. So for me, I’m doing a presentation on the 1848 revolution of Vienna, and specifically looking at the fact that in this revolution, there was a large participation from college students in Vienna, and they felt like this was a way for their voices to be heard. And so they go out and protest in the streets, and some of them are armed, and they’re going out and being a part of the revolution. And so there’s some really interesting paintings in the museum that have clearly depicted young people and crowds in the streets of Vienna and some very recognizable places in the city.”

Shelby Middleton, a freshman majoring in nursing, is also a student from Oklahoma Christian participating in the spring study abroad semester.

On her experience in Vienna so far, Middleton said,

“First off, amazing. I absolutely love it, just being immersed into the culture. It’s completely different. People are so quiet here, and I love it so much. It’s just beautiful, the history, it’s just so rich. You can just see in the architecture, the fact that every building that you walk by is way older than any building in America is insane.”

The Vienna Museum has a little bit of history from every stage the city has endured to get to this point in time. Many of the exhibits have visual elements and artifacts that hold the attention of their audience.

“I absolutely loved the museum. It was amazing. I didn’t realize I was a museum person,” Middleton said. “As far as what stood out to me the most throughout the whole museum, and what I’m going to be doing my presentation over, is jewish life in Vienna. From the very first level, it kind of just got me thinking about the Holocaust and how jews were discriminated against. We keep reading about anti semitism, which we also talk about in our class with Dr. Kevin Simpson… It’s also just very interesting that, of all things that God could have put Jesus in the world as, Jesus was a jew. Not that it was his identity, but that’s what he came into the world as,” Middleton said. “It was just so fascinating to see the ups and downs of everything they’ve been through, especially in Vienna, being that, like it was conquered, the Nazis came in and took so many people’s lives and property. And yet, now that I’m standing here today, I don’t see any of that. I can just walk around Vienna and see it as ‘oh, that’s so gorgeous’. But then to actually realize so many people have walked here and footsteps have been here before mine have. There’s so much that I don’t know, and I want to know,” said Middleton.

The study abroad program also focuses on spiritual growth and understanding through class discussions and devotionals, honing in on strengthening personal relationships with God and understanding our identity in Christ while in this new place and culture.

Middleton said, “I mean, I’m seeing God in all the little things, today in our cross cultural class, Ashley put it as, ‘the once easy things are now becoming hard again’. So it’s just like the adulting, having to get the groceries, having to cook, having to do all these little things that we know how to do, but just relearning it all. I’m seeing God through my routine, just because I’m completely doing it on my own now, and it’s in the little moments. There’s something beautiful about the quiet and the simplicity of Vienna. I feel God just working through things. I feel Him in the past because of how rich history is here. His faithfulness through it all, through all the good and bad.”

While in Vienna, study abroad students are able to see and experience so many different cultures while holding firm to their identity found in Christ.