University of Jena in the final round of the Excellence Competition

Prof. Dr Johannes Grave is the spokesperson for the "Imaginamics" project.

Image: Jens Meyer (University of Jena)

Improving our understanding of social conflicts

Current debates, whether on climate change, democracy, or the pandemic, create the impression that people live in different, barely reconcilable worlds of imagination. However, these "social imaginations" are rarely set in stone, but rather struggle for validity and dominance in dynamic processes. Such "struggles for meaning" reveal the fundamentally open, conflictual character of social coexistence that requires negotiation. They will be analysed in the project "Imaginamics. Practices and Dynamics of Social Imagining".

The artificial word "Imaginamics", made up of imagination and dynamics, indicates that it is about fluid, dynamic processes. These dynamics also always have a practical side; they are "made" and driven by social and political actors. This is why the Imaginamics project is not only dedicated to social imaginations as such, but also to the practices of "social imagining" from which they emerge.

"We are delighted that the panel of experts considers our project outline to be forward-looking and recognizes our particular strengths in this field of research. We will now dedicate ourselves to the challenge of further developing our ideas – together with many partners locally, in the region and worldwide – in a full proposal. The importance of gaining a better understanding of social imaginations and their very own dynamics is highlighted not least by the many discussions and demonstrations of recent weeks," says art historian Prof. Dr Johannes Grave, who together with science historian Prof. Dr Christina Brandt and historian Prof. Dr Joachim von Puttkamer forms the Imaginamics spokesperson team.