SFB 1567:  Virtuelle Lebenswelten

• Subject Area: Humanities ; Social and Behavioural Sciences
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 470106373

Today, virtuality is a driving force for social and cultural transformation processes. It has become so differentiated in its manifestations that it can be detached from the nimbus of the special and its normalization can be observed in the abundance of lifeworld references. This is where the planned SFB Virtual Lifeworlds comes in, by taking a look at knowledge contents, practices, forms of negotiations and networking dynamics on the basis of a broad expertise in the humanities, social sciences and cultural studies. The research projects ask in an overarching perspective which social subsystems implement virtuality in which way and what consequences this has for individual subjects and their constitution, for lifeworld and aesthetic practices as well as for social organizations and opera-tions. In particular, the change in what constitutes science and what determines its everyday activities, not only in research and teaching, but also in administration and knowledge management, in public relations and research data management beyond the academic sphere, serves as a unifying perspective. In this way, the SFB specifically intervenes in processes of change in the lifeworld, where science apparently only achieves the genesis of its methodology, the communication of its results, the aesthetic reflection of its procedures and concepts of education in the moment of a delay that is often regarded as constitutive. Against the inertial forces of an institution, new dynamics are to be set free. The planned SFB will develop the Virtual University in close feedback with the research projects, many of which are related to the present. The Virtual University will provide a common framework that combines moments of self-reflection with strategies of academic communication that addresses an interested public and provides a spatial and technical infrastructure that does justice to the special features of the subject area of virtual living environments. The Virtual University claims to go beyond the academic sphere, to radiate into the region and to promote a culture of participation.With the claim of reflective shaping of its own research beyond the normal level, the planned SFB is thus itself changing a piece of the lifeworld that is decisive for the knowledge society of the future. The goal is not only to view this normalization as a successful process, but also to bring along the accompanying aspects of the fragile, the chaotic, and the encroaching, and thus to open up a moment of critique that serves as a corrective against the backdrop of the virtualization thrusts forced by the pandemic.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres

Current projects

• A01 - Virtual Image Archives: Visuality, Operativity, Logistics (Project Head Rothöhler, Simon )
• A02 - Virtual Information Infrastructures: The data centre as infrastructurer of natural and epistemic processes (Project Head Sørensen, Ph.D., Estrid )
• A03 - Virtual Environments: Sensoalgorithmic Virtuality in Autonomous Cars (Project Head Sprenger, Florian )
• B01 - Possible Worlds: Virtuality in the Novel of the 18th and Early 19th Centuries (Project Heads Binczek, Natalie ;  Schäfer, Armin )
• B02 - Virtual Middle Ages: History, Historical Culture, Public History (Project Heads Bunnenberg, Christian ;  Oschema, Klaus )
• B03 - Virtual Education: Formations and Transformations of Educational Knowledge (‚Bildungswis-sen‘) (Project Heads Ricken, Norbert ;  Scholz, Joachim )
• B04 - Virtual Texts: The Making of ‚Text‘ as Object of Knowledge in Literary Studies (Project Head Lechtermann, Christina )
• C01 - Talking and Acting about Food in the Virtual Lifeworld: Food Studying in the University (Project Head Aßmann, Sandra )
• C02 - Virtual Bodies: Towards an Epistemology of Embodiment (Project Head Rieger, Stefan )
• C03 - Virtual Art: World, Body and Object References in VR-Experiences (Project Head Urban, Annette )
• C04 - Normative Image Spaces: Virtual and Imaginary Dynamics of Epistemic Topologies (Project Head Behrmann, Carolin )
• D01 - Virtual Disputes and Controversies: Forums and Tribunalization (Project Heads Balke, Friedrich ;  Gaderer, Rupert )
• D02 - Virtuality in Contemporary German-Language Literature: Quantity and Connectivity (Project Heads Binczek, Natalie ;  Schäfer, Armin )
• D03 - Virtual Common Ground: Language and Virtual Identity (Project Head Scheffler, Tatjana )
• D04 - Virtual Affects: History, Technology, Aesthetic Politics (Project Head Tuschling, Anna )
• INF - Infrastructure Project: Technology and praxeology (Project Heads Scholz, Joachim ;  Sørensen, Ph.D., Estrid ;  Tuschling, Anna )
• WS - Central Service Project: Methods and Didactics (Project Heads Aßmann, Sandra ;  Rothöhler, Simon ;  Schäfer, Armin ;  Sprenger, Florian )
• Z - Central Administrative Project: Management and Scientific Coordination (Project Head Rieger, Stefan )
• Ö - Public Relations Project: Mediation and Evidence (Project Heads Bunnenberg, Christian ;  Rieger, Stefan ;  Urban, Annette )

• Applicant Institution: Ruhr-Universität Bochum
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Stefan Rieger