Cluster Asia and Europe - Uni Heidelberg: Home

Asia and Europe in a Global Context

The Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context: Shifting Asymmetries in Cultural Flows" at Heidelberg University is part of the Excellence Initiative of the German state and federal governments. The objective of the Cluster is to examine processes of cultural exchange with a strong focus on interdisciplinary research.

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Workshop on the Culture of Stress

"The Culture of Stress" is the topic of a workshop on May 22 and 23 at the Karl Jaspers Centre. It is held by project C5 "Stress and Stress Relief". Prof. Richard Wilkinson from University of Nottingham, UK, will give a keynote speech with the title "Inequality: The enemy between us?"

The picture series "Visualising Stress Effects" will be shown in an exhibition from May 22 to June 19 at the Karl Jaspers Centre. The artist Kristin Herrmann will open the vernissage on May 22 at 3.30 pm in context of the conference "The Culture of Stress", organised by project C5 "Stress and Stress-Relief".

Somnath Batabyal, Ph.D. (London), has been appointed Lecturer for Media in Development at the Centre for Media and Film Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London.

Professor Subrata K. Mitra, Ph.D. (Rochester), former Speaker of Research Area A, and Coordinator of Research Project A1 ‘Citizenship as Conceptual Flow’ has edited the book “Citizenship and the Flow of Ideas in the Era of Globalization: Structure, Agency, and Power”.

"Imaging Disaster" is the topic of the Cluster's lecture series during the summer term. On Monday from 6 to 8 pm, Valerie Hammerbacher (Stuttgart) gave a talk in Darmstadt on "Der Aufruhr der Elemente - der Vulkanausbruch: Eine Motivstudie zur englischen Naturästhetik des 18. Jahrhunderts".

The history of the state and the process of state-building were the topics of an international conference at the Karl Jaspers Centre from May 10 to 12, 2012. The conference "Entanglement of Histories, Circulation of Knowledge, and Transfer of Technologies: Dimensions of Transcultural Statehood? (1500 – 1900)" was organised by project A9 "Cultural Transfer".

The Master Programme in Transcultural Studies at Heidelberg University welcomes applications. Students from all over the globe are invited to study the dynamics of transcultural exchanges. International candidates educated in the humanities, cultural or social sciences can submit their documents until June 15.

Current and historical developments in South Asia will be discussed in 50 daily lectures during the summer semester. From April 19 to July 27, the South Asia Institute invites to a lecture series called "Academic Lunch Break". The lectures will be held from Monday to Friday from 12:30 to 1 pm in the Peterskirche.

The South Asia Institute (SAI) invited to a "Week of Celebration" on the occasion of its 50th anniversary. The week started with an opening function in the Old Auditorium of Heidelberg University on May 8, and closed with an open day on May 12 in the Institute.

This film portrait introduces the work of the Chair of Visual and Media Anthropology held by Prof. Christiane Brosius. With a particular focus on research-based teaching, it shows how faculty, PhD-students and students respond to the challenges of globalisation by examining and analysing transcultural and transnational practices and phenomena.

The University of Chicago, particularly its Department of History, is one of the international key partners of the Cluster "Asia and Europe". The cooperation includes even "Heidelberg Prize Lectureships".

"Seeing Matter(s): Materiality and Visuality" discusses this year's summer school from July 29 to August 4.

Careers Service

Funding and career opportunities for young researchers.

Service for Families

Newsletter by the Service for Families Office (PDF, German)

Gender and Diversity

Newsletter by the Equal Opportunities Office (PDF, German)

E-Journal

Peer-reviewed, open-source e-journal on Transcultural Studies

Cluster Book Series

Transcultural flows and concepts of hybridization discusses the new book by Philipp W. Stockhammer.

The spring issue of the newsletter has been published.

Find reports, interviews, and films on Page 2

DFG Cluster Portrait

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Cluster introduction on the DFG Video Portal on the Excellence Initiative.

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Graduate Programme for Transcultural Studies
The Graduate Programme for Transcultural Studies (GPTS) offers a structured PhD programme within the interdisciplinary research environment of the Cluster. The doctoral programme offers (a) an introduction to theories and methodologies of transcultural studies, (b) access to a well-equipped work environment supported by European and Asian institutions, (c) participation in the gathering of textual and nontextual source material, (d) support of PhD projects which are linked to the broad research fields pursued by the Cluster.

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Research Area A: Governance & Administration
This Research Area deals with the cultural flows through which concepts, institutions and practices that have to do with governance and administration are transferred across cultures locally, regionally, or globally, and are reconfigured in a continuous but non-linear historical process.

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A1 Citizenship as conceptual flow: Asia in a comparative perspective

A2 Cultural flows in history education: shifting re-creations of European and Asian ‘Others’ in East Asian schoolbooks

All projects in Research Area A

Research Area B: Public Spheres
Central themes of Research Area B are public spheres - as media, events and spaces - that have been and are built by political and cultural flows between Asia and Europe. There are three research foci: a) aspects of mediality, visuality and textuality, b) aspects of public life, events and performance, and c) aspects of public space and urbanity.

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B1 Gauging Cultural Asymmetries: Asian Satire and the Search for Identity in the Era of Colonialism and Imperialism

B2 Creative Dissonances: Music in a Global Context

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Research Area C: Health & Environment
Research Area C focuses on the transfer between Asia and Europe of practices concerning, institutions for, ideas about, and perceptions of health and environment. Practice is the privileged point of access in this Research Area because the processes underlying both health and environment are juxtaposed here with the often pressing need to find a working solution.

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C1 Medical Systems in Transition: The Case of the Ancient Near East

C2 Large Dams: Contested Environments between Hydro-Power and Resistance

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Research Area D: Historicities & Heritage
This Research Area analyses different concepts of histories as competing interpretations of time and space. Instead of focusing on models of unified universal or world history, it puts the emphasis on the entanglement of multiple historicities with different cultural background through cultural flows in the way in which history, memory, and their trajectory are handled.

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D1 Historicizing the Experience of Violence without Frontiers. Influence and Importance of Shifting Asymmetries.

D2 Materiality and Practice: Cultural Entanglements of 2nd millennium BC East Mediterranean Societies

All projects in Research Area D

Heidelberg Research Architecture
The Cluster brings together a multicultural, multilingual scholarly community for purposes of research in an interdisciplinary field. Efficient collaboration among the researchers in the analysis of transcultural flows requires an IT infrastructure for data storage and exchange, communication and on-line team-work, and, importantly, for information retrieval and analysis.

HRA-Portal