Research

Hosting seven different departments, the Faculty of Humanities is the biggest and most diverse faculty at TU Chemnitz. The faculty’s researchers engage in permanent and active transdisciplinary exchange and share the following research interests:

Skills for information and knowledge based societies (New Media)
European culture and European history (Europe)
Politics and Society

Along with group projects, individual research remains an important area. The faculty’s scientists maintain an active and innovative research and publication record and hold an excellent national and international renown. They are members of important scientific and editorial boards and aim to share their expertise with the wider public. The faculty members’ shared commitment to address contemporary challenges and questions with a historical awareness of their formation shapes their teaching and the qualifications of our alumni. The close vicinity of the MINT-department on campus is also reflected in the curricula of the Faculty of Humanities. High standards of scientific qualifications across academic fields and flexibility in conceptual and methodical approaches make our alumni desired employees and give them the best opportunities for being accepted into MA and Ph.D. programmes to further their academic careers.

Research Areas

Institute for English and American Studies

Anglophone literature and culture worldwide (esp. New English Literatures)
Applied Linguistics (Cognitive Linguistics, Sociolinguistics) and English language characteristics worldwide
National identities, cultures and social developments in Great Britian and the USA from a historical and comparative point of view

Institute for European History

Regions in Europe: society, economy, and politics from the 18^th to the 20^th century (Central and Eastern Europe, UK)
Long-term developments in European integration and segregation from Antiquity to Modernity
Elites in Europe: monarchy, nobility, and bourgeoisie from the Middle Ages to the 20^th century

Institute for European Studies

Europe between East and West
Studies in European regionality
Lanuguages, cultures, and institutions in Europe

Institute for German and Communication Studies

Language, literature, culture
Interaction, texts and discourse, tradition
Synchronic and diachronic intercultural hermeneutics
Mediality, knowledge and cognition, technical application

Institute for Media Studies

Mixed media forms of reality and virtual reality
Presentation, communication, interaction, games, and learning in multimedia
Cognition, emotion, and social and cultural practices in multimodal use and the production of media

Institute for Education

Education in a knowledge-based society
Institutional cultures of teaching and learning
Professionalization and professionalism
Temporality and biographies in educational processes

Institute for Political Science

Intellectual History
Elections and parties
Foreign policy analysis
International political economy
Political culture and extremism

Academic mission statement for the Faculty of Humanities

The defining characteristic of all fields of study at the Faculty of Humanities is cultural, social, political, historical, and methodological reflection about phenomena in their contemporary forms along with their historical development and context.

Of particular attention is the mediation and hermeneutic aspects of these phenomena – particularly concerning language as the prime communication medium yet also considering new and newest media forms. Special emphasis is put on the intercultural dimensions of these aspects, subsuming considerations of spatial and temporal distance. Questions about what these phenomena are, how they work and how they can be understood are constitutive and guiding for all fields of study.

At the Faculty of Humanities important contemporary questions with social, political and cultural implications in a globalizing world are addressed with a historical conscience. Aiming for holistic education in teaching and reflection on educational processes in research, the Faculty of Humanities at TU Chemnitz offers a specific academic profile to our alumni and many possibilities for exchange and enrichment across academic fields without neglecting the diverse and differentiated cultures of the individual disciplines. (Excerpted from the Faculty Development Plan 2013)