Urban Control Regimes. Railway Stations as Infrastructure of Human Categorization (C04)

• Subject Area: Theatre and Media Studies
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 442261292

The research project examines railway stations as exemplary infrastructures of human categorization. The railway station sorts people according to general social criteria (such as class or gender) and by local criteria sensitive to deviance. Based on the cases of the Paris railway stations of the 19th century and digitalized “security stations” of the 21st century (especially Berlin Südkreuz), the research project analyzes, on the one hand, the specific materiality and operativity of railway stations and, on the other, the technological changes of human categorization. Thus, it combines a study of the infrastructure of human categorization with a media history of surveillance.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres
• Subproject of: SFB 1482: Studies in Human Categorization
• Applicant Institution: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
• Project Head: Professorin Dr. Gabriele Schabacher