Humanities

Since the 19th century the Humanities have constituted an integral part of the canon of subjects traditionally taught at universities. Reflecting upon culture in its entire breadth is part of their self-concept and one of their principal functions:  The ­Humanities examine and research language and languages, forms of interaction, literature and cultural communities in their diverse disciplines from a historical, normative, theological, geographical, aesthetic, artistic, linguistic or communicative perspective. Through their specific approach, which is not subservient to economic considerations but committed to critical enlightenment and education, the ­Humanities make their specific and indispensable contribution to the discourse of self-reflexivity in society.

Given this general focus, one of the central areas of research in the Humanities presently is human migration. An activity as ancient as humankind itself, migration has caused our ­species to “move ahead” not only figuratively, but literally. Whenever human beings leave their home territory to take up residence in another place, this gives rise to phenomena of cultural, social and linguistic change which, in turn, ­challenge as well as enrich societies that are in a state of continual flux. The theme of “Migration and Multilingualism” is one of the central research areas in our faculty and will therefore be given special emphasis in the following report. By focusing on one central topic from among the entire array of research activities in our faculty, the report thus takes up the principle of the preceding report, so as to be able to do better justice to individual projects. The previous research ­report focused on “Urbanism and Metropolitan Areas”, a theme that has quite a number of contact points and areas of overlap with the field of “Migration and Multilingualism”. Our teaching and research thus reflect the diversity of the Ruhr District, an urban region that is a contact zone where people from different social, ethnic and cultural backgrounds interact. A complete overview of the manifold research activities in our faculty is available online at www.uni-due.de/geisteswissenschaften/forschung.