Based on the theoretical and methodological potentials of the historical humanities – especially the interdisciplinary interaction of linguistics, religious studies, history, philosophy, as well as literary, linguistic, and cultural studies – and in close dialogue with the political and social sciences, the Profile Area "Universality & Diversity" poses the culturally, socially, and politically highly topical question of how to deal constructively with religious, cultural, and linguistic diversity, and the inherent opportunities and conflicts. The common framework of the Profile Area’s research fields and approaches is based on the assumption that knowledge in the humanities proves itself in the face of the current societal challenges that arise in the field of tension between the general validity claims of prominent guiding concepts – such as culture, reason and language – and the conceptual articulation and historical perspectivization of lived diversity. In addition to the analysis of phenomena and debates characteristic of European societies and cultures, Goethe University’s professional competencies in the analysis of knowledge orders beyond the European range of experiences are of central importance in this context.
Anja Middelbeck-Varwick
Profile Area Spokesperson
Sita Steckel
|Spokespersons
“Nearly all current societal changes are shaped by tensions and negotiations between diversity and universality. To understand the resulting conflicts and to identify and reflect on potentials for our society, we need the key tools offered by the Humanities, Social Sciences and Cultural Studies. Our goal is to make these opportunities more visible.”
André Stephan
Key Research Areas
Amid the growing complexity of coexistence in post-migrant societies, experiences of diversity and demand for unifying aspects of cultural differences are becoming increasingly important. Multilingualism is becoming as common in Western societies as it already is in many areas of the global South. Moreover, it is possible to discern a growing diversity of religious convictions and cultural practices, even if these sometimes also demarcate themselves from one another and require new translation efforts. In Western societies especially, previously established categorical systems of order and forms of government are sometimes put to an existential test by these dynamics. In this context, beyond the mostly present-oriented and prognostic analyses of the social sciences, the basic knowledge of linguistics, religious studies, and history, the conceptual differentiation and reflexive capacity of philosophy and cultural studies, as well as the intra- and intercultural translation competence of literary, linguistic, and cultural studies prove to be crucial social resources.
Against this background, the Profile Area "Universality and Diversity: Linguistic, Religious, and Cultural Dynamics" bundles the relevant competencies of the aforementioned disciplines at Goethe University and, using methods and approaches from the humanities, provides answers to these pressing contemporary challenges with the necessary historical depth.
Dynamics of the Religious
The aim of this key research area and the research collaboration of the same name is to use interdisciplinary and interreligious explorations to examine the mutual relations and perceptions – dialogical or conflictual – between the three inherently diverse religions "Judaism", "Christianity" and "Islam" in different historical and contemporary contexts. Key is the common interest in phenomena of understanding one's own and foreign religions in multi-religious and secular constellations; in interreligious dynamics of cultural transfer, translation, appropriation and transformation of religious-cultural knowledge orders; as well as in the rational, emotional and political-social conditions of the possibility for religious dialogues and understanding.
Multilingual Agency
This key research area is concerned with current global challenges and crises, among others, through worldwide migration movements of people, languages and cultures. It deals with challenges that regionally oriented research is increasingly facing as a result of globalization dynamics and transregionalization processes. This can be exemplified by the LOEWE priority area "Minority Studies - Language and Identity". It examines the interactions of factors that determine identity, such as language, religion, culture and ethnicity, from the point of view of the self and of others, both "in one's own country" and "abroad".
This is closely related to the phenomenon of moving cultures, multilingual societies and hybrid language practices. Multilingualism has an impact on different levels. Research in this area can be devoted to individual requirements, but also investigate dimensions of societal heterogeneity up to global communication. Many of these processes and mechanisms are phenomena of so-called translanguaging: Here, the linguistic repertoire of individuals is no longer understood as a mosaic of different individual languages, but as a complex overall linguistic repertoire. In addition, written practice and oral communication, especially in the fields of new media and digital communication, have to be analyzed in connection. Multilateral multilingualism and multimodality require new ways of description, interpretation and representation. The key research area "Multilingual Agency" wants to contribute to this in an innovative way.
Aesthetics: Materiality, Mediality, Potentiality
Questions of perception and form are central to understanding the dynamics of complex societies. Far from being an isolated realm of recreation through beauty, the arts have been a central site of symbolization, articulation and negotiation of current concerns and conflicts from modernity to the present. Beyond the narrower field of the arts, architecture and design are central to an understanding of the material conditions of coexistence and their impact on the shaping of historical and contemporary ways of life. The arts, design and architecture are also important forums for anticipating future challenges and media for designing future forms of society.
Questions of aesthetics in its dimensions of materiality, mediality and potentiality have long been a central focus at the Goethe University and one that has shaped its profile. Since 2015, research expertise in the field of aesthetics has also been bundled at Goethe University in the Master's degree program in Aesthetics, which is unique in Germany and involves seven subjects from three departments.
The Blueprint of the Human Language
Faculty Despite the many apparent differences regarding sounds, words, and structures between the languages of the world, all languages are based on universal principles that characterize them as being part of human cognition. Our linguistic research program aims to uncover these principles and the rules of their interaction to gain a deeper understanding of the blueprint of the human language faculty.
Three essential insights of modern linguistic theory constitute the starting point of our research program: first, linguistic expressions are organized hierarchically, although superficially, linguistic signals consist of a linear concatenation of sounds, words and sentences. Second, linguistic variation, both diachronically and across typologically different languages, is not random but restricted in systematic ways. The blueprint of the human language faculty therefore determines the commonalities among languages and, moreover, the range of linguistic variation and its limits. Third, the human language faculty is organized in a modular fashion, comprising the core modules of language, phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics and pragmatics. To arrive at a coherent model of the grammatical architecture underlying the human language faculty, specific research questions need to be addressed, using research methods tailored to the particular module under investigation.
Accordingly, we investigate the relation between the variable and invariable principles of language to answer central research questions that form the common basis of the linguistic research carried out at Goethe University.
- In which way does the blueprint of the human language faculty determine the acquisition of one or more specific first languages?
- How can the typological heterogeneity of the languages of the world be captured within a general blueprint of human language?
- To what extent are the different modules of the human language organized in a parallel fashion?
- Does the diachronic variation between different stages of the same language mirror the same general principles as synchronic variation between genetically close and distant languages?
- How does linguistic knowledge interact with other cognitive systems in production and comprehension?
The Profile Area gives national and international visibility to excellent collaborative research initiatives and individual projects that focus on different aspects and dimensions of linguistic, religious and cultural dynamics. Specifically, it investigates the conditions and possibilities of religious and cultural processes of comprehension and transformation as well as the structures and practices of cultural memory and cultural heritage, the foundations of human linguistic ability, the power of architectural concepts to shape culture and society, the role of digital infrastructures in processes of cultural meaning production, the relationship between democracy and aesthetics, the human-animal difference, and the control potential of historical and contemporary forms of state rule.