Profile

The professorship for General Sociology and Sociological Theories raises the fundamental question of how social commonality and the diverse network of relationships between people, things, technology and the environment, the processes of socialization and their unequal initial conditions, social structures and their dynamics, forms of differentiation and power structures, social problems and protest behavior in focus.

Due to its multiparadigmatic setting, sociology opens up a whole variety of perspectives on these different social and societal relations and draws its particular analytical strength from this diversity. In teaching, it is therefore very important to us to convey the entire spectrum of theories in the discipline, whereby the theories are developed in a systematized manner and compared with one another, even so the independent application of the theories is tested and the different perspectives are critically discussed.

The research perspectives taken by the professorship are no less varied: the professorship's staff research a whole range of topics that are directly related to various social transformation processes – such as the far-reaching social changes since the 1960s, but also the central challenges of the present such as climate change, digitisation and increasing social tensions and lines of conflict. A particular research focus of the professorship is in the field of popular culture (pop music, festivals, gaming). But political sociology is also represented in the professorship with studies on voting behavior, the sustainable use of resources, whistleblowing and questions of criticism and conflict theory.

More detailed information on the individual research projects can be found under Research and on the personal pages of the staff in the professorship.