Social Geography

How are societies organized from a spatial perspective? What role does space play in social interaction? These two questions stand at the center of social geographic research interest. City development and the analysis processes of globalization and regionalization are among the topics analyzed by social geography. Additionally, social geography is concerned with the local and regional expression of various cultural forms as well as with the historical development of techniques of using nature and resultant cultural landscapes.

Our research team aims to link social theory and human geography both methodologically and epistemologically. Present research concentrates on the development of ‚action-oriented geography’ towards a more general geographic theory of practice. In this context, empirical investigations of everyday “geography-making” are pursued.
Specifically, these approaches include research on symbolic appropriations and image constructions in local and regional contexts. Using the research results should, moreover, help to broaden the types of professional positions available to geographers in the fields of socio-political practice (e.g. politics of integration, youth, and gender).