Ästhetische Kommunikation (AEK)

Abstract

This doctoral programme in literary and cultural studies concerns itself with the linguistic and cultural diversity of aesthetic communication, focusing on understanding the methods, theories and research paradigms that literary and cultural studies share.
The programme aims to intensify both the critical discourse with influential theories from literary and cultural studies and the interdisciplinary dialogue between the different disciplines involved. The range of topics extends from classic models from literary and comparative literary studies to poetical, semiotic and sociological questions to newer cultural studies approaches to areas of research extending beyond language, literature and culture, such as migration and post-colonialism, cultural semiotics and literary aesthetics, gender and queer studies, literature and popular fiction, identity and hybridity, memory and trauma, mediality and materiality. Theories and approaches that have developed in specific research traditions and are now anchored there will be discussed as ‘travelling concepts’ as part of the interdisciplinary dialogue within the programme.
Often the sheer complexity of aesthetic communication requires multiple methods and metalanguages. Currently, the following disciplines are involved in the programme:

• English and American Studies
• German Studies
• Classical Studies 
• Romance Studies
• Slavonic Studies
• Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies 

Coordinated activities such as workshops, research presentation days, panel discussions and guest lectures serve to give participants a broader insight into methods and theories and to stimulate both doctoral students and their advisors to exchange ideas with scholars across the traditional boundaries of their disciplines.
The programme offers doctoral students a framework in which they receive the encouragement and support they need to complete their projects on schedule. Additionally, it actively supports them as they participate in conferences, publish articles in (peer-reviewed) scholarly journals and organise their own workshops.