PhD Initiatives HGGS Peer Mentoring
Peer Mentoring is a forum for thematically-focused research within the Graduate School. HGGS members are encouraged to establish study groups in order to research key concepts of the humanities, law or social sciences and to interconnect through their work with scholars from different research cultures. Peer Mentoring groups can be supported by professors, postdocs or professionals from different fields in Germany, Europe or abroad. The results of the intensive research projects will be made accessible to other members of the HGGS and to a wider public through exhibitions, publications, conferences, workshops, podcasts and/or other formats. The Graduate School can grant its members financial and logistic support of PhD-driven initiatives originating in the HGGS.
Bridges and Crossings
At the 2024 Summer Forum, HGGS members and invited scholars experimented with different ways of expressing and communicating scientific findings. These included a classic paper presentation, a flash talk video presentation or other creative formats to talk about their research (poems, photographs, collages), which were compiled by members of the Graduate School in a zine and presented at the forum. In this issue you will find contributions from HGGS members as well as guest contributions from Brazil, Spain and South Africa: Kanya Viljoen, Cristian Camilo Cuervo, Matias Castrén, Julia van Duijvenvoorde, Bahar Akgün-Ergeçen, Pieter du Plessis, Tomás Cajueiro (with photos by Daniel Arroyo, Jardiel Carvalho, Marcela Gregory, Rogerio Padula; curator: Genivaldo Amorim), Marco Del Din (with photos by Ruven Afanador) and Nell van der Merwe.
Decoloniality and Feminism on the Edge: Epistemologies, Dissenting Subjects and Aesthetics
“Decolonial feminism” was born in Latin America in the 2000s by female scholars and activists from all over the continent, who evidenced that feminism should be conceived related to the fact that the colonial structures remained until today in culture and societies. Consequently, decolonial feminism points out the importance of the intersectionality between gender, class, ethnicity, and religion impacted by coloniality and insufficiently addressed by western feminism. An intersectional and decolonial focus allows us to think feminism, on the one hand, from a wider and more holistic perspective where gender problematics are related to economic, sociological and ecological variables, among others. On the other hand, it evidences the particular contradictions within human relationships, institutions and cultural stereotypes. This conference and workshop brought together scholars from the HGGS, Heidelberg University, Vienna University and University of Sao Paulo for discussions of the cultural and epistemological place of “feminisms” from interdisciplinary perspectives.
The Spectre haunting academia: Understanding the role of academia in the rise of far-right
The aim of this conference was to situate the rise of the Far-Right in conjunction with academic spaces and practices i.e., to understand the macroscopic role Academia has in producing, challenging, and responding to the proliferation of this adaptive ideology. How do scholarly practices and the Far-right interact? How do Far-right governments impact Academia, both nationally and globally? Why are Academia’s responses to and/or co-options by the Far-right so culturally impactful? This is just a selection of questions the conference addressed, especially in the fields of Humanities and Social Sciences, whose engagement with the Far-right has been historically more pervasive.
This conference was addressed specifically to researchers, PhD candidates, and final-semester Master students from 4EU+ partner universities. Researchers from other universities were also welcome. The conference took place at Heidelberg University on 3-4 Sept. 2022.
