Four Million Euros in Funding for the new DFG Research Training Group »Media Anthropology«
On 1 April 2020, the newly established Research Training Group will begin its work at the Faculty of Media of the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. The DFG (German Research Foundation) is funding the facility with 4.13 million euros over a period of four and a half years. During the funding period, twelve doctoral students and two post-doctoral students will have the opportunity to investigate the diverse, existential relationships in which people and the media are interwoven.
The current revolutionary developments in the fields of media and technology are characterised by an increasing entanglement of nature and technology, biology and artefacts, as well as the human and the non-human. This leads to numerous different combinations of media (technologies) and human modes of existence. The Research Training Group will investigate the resulting issues, e.g.: How are human experiences and existences to be understood in the face of these pervasive changes; where do they begin and where do they end? How should one approach conventional distinctions with regard to life orientation – e.g. between man and woman, own and foreign, human and non-human, original and future – in view of these technological, ecological and media-related uncertainties? And last, but not least: How can and must previous scientific statements about these issues be revised?
By April 2020, twelve Ph.D. and two postdoctoral positions will be filled. Applications may be submitted until 15 January 2020. The research projects of the fellows are supervised by eight professors from the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar and the Munich Academy of Fine Arts, led by Prof. Dr. Christiane Voss. The Research Training Group is internationally orientated and its activity follows in the footsteps of many years of successful employment of the International College for Cultural Technology Research and Media Philosophy (IKKM) and the Media Anthropology Centre of Excellence (KOMA).
The Research Training Group will also collaborate closely with numerous cultural institutions in Weimar: the museums of the Klassik Stiftung Weimar, the German National Theatre, Goethe and Schiller Archive, Duchess Anna Amalia Library, Museum of Prehistory and Early History of Thuringia, Buchenwald Memorial and the Lichthaus Cinema. The programme of the Research Training Group includes lecture series, a film series and other events at which the issues and the investigative results will be discussed publicly.
Background:
Research Training Groups are temporary university facilities for the promotion and funding of young scientists. Doctoral students have the opportunity to carry out their Ph.D. thesis within the framework of a structured research programme. Research Training Groups distinguish themselves thanks to their high scientific quality and originality on an international level.
Further information about the research training group can be found in its own section of the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar website: www.uni-weimar.de/gkma
For any further questions, please contact Tim Othold:
Tim Othold
Cranachstraße 47, Zi. 005
Phone: + 49 (0) 36 43/58 40 03
Email: tim.othold@uni-weimar.de