Materiality and Production

Production’ and ‚Materiality’ are crucial terms of aesthetic and cultural history which the graduate school attempts to explore in systematic and genealogical terms. Concepts of matter are produced by cultural dynamics, and these concepts vary historically. Even the production of ideal or immaterial values and concepts requires a material context and foundation. We thus aim to surpass the binary opposition of constructivist/relativistic versus materialistic approaches in order to employ historic and contemporary models of cultural and social practices in the wider field of aesthetic experience and aesthetic production (gesture, ornament, script, object art etc.).

The graduate school cooperates with French, English and North-American partners. The methodology and themes of the research program are thus situated in an international context which pays due consideration to the research foci of our fellow institutions: historical anthropology, ethnology and sociology  as in the case of our French partners, the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales or the Sorbonne. Expert representatives of disciplines not covered by the scope of departments that form part of the school will be invited for guest lectures and workshops.

Since the summer semester 2006, preparation work has included various conferences in Düsseldorf and Paris. The on-going cooperation with the French institutions mentioned above has been realized both on the level of research and of teaching (summer schools, colloquia). These activities will be intensified; double degrees / cotutelles de thèse will be offered, which will eventually lead to an International Graduate School in the second phase of the program.