Projects
Table of contents
Ongoing research and transfer projects
Duration: 01.10.2021-31.12.2024
Project Management: Prof. Dr. Dominik Steiger and Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project cooperation: Diakonisches Werk der Ev.-Luth. Landeskirche Sachsens e.V. and Arbeiterwohlfahrt (AWO) Sachsen
Funding: Saxon State Ministry of Justice and for Democracy, Europe and Equality
The Refugee Law Clinic Dresden (RLCD) offers free and independent legal advice on questions of asylum and residence law and thus contributes to the protection of the rights and interests of refugees and migrants. The legal advice and support of those seeking advice in these areas of law is provided by students who are being trained as volunteer legal advisors as a supplement to university teaching at the TU Dresden.
The project includes the training of student volunteer migration legal advisors, supervision and close supervision and training by a fully qualified lawyer, as well as scientific project support.
The training takes place in the legal field of migration law - especially in asylum and residence law. This is seldom found as a subject matter in the study of law or other courses (political science, social work, etc.) and is not part of the mandatory content for the first state examination. Only a few chairs of law faculties focus their teaching and research on migration law. The RLCD training provides expertise in the special field of migration law. In two semesters, students are trained to become voluntary legal advisors in asylum and residence law.
In six counseling centers in Dresden, including initial reception facilities, the RLCD advises refugees on questions of residence law; due to the pandemic, a large part of the counseling currently takes place online.
Duration: 1.5.2021-30.4.2023 (Development Phase)
Project coordination: Dr Patricia Ward
Funding: The development phase is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Free State of Saxony as part of the federal and state excellence strategy. This project is expected to start on 01.05.2023 and is funded by the German Research Foundation.
How does ‘displacement’, framed as an unprecedented global problem, organize society? How do perceptions of someone or something as ‘out of place’ (e.g. refugees, asylum-seekers) mobilize and order ‘the worth’ of human and non-human resources in our world? This project considers these questions in terms of ‘humanitarian logistics’: touted by aid stakeholders as a key component of preventing displacement from occurring in the first place. Scholars and practitioners alike have long documented how aid practices and logistics mitigate but also produce social inequalities. However, the scope and meanings associated with ‘humanitarian logistics’ remain loosely defined and ambiguous.
This project subsequently strives to account for this ambiguity and how it first, may reflect competing logics, between state and non-state actors regarding ‘how’ humanitarian aid should be organized to prevent and respond to displacement. Second, this project looks at this ambiguity to consider how it may also be indicative of changing relations and positions of power within the humanitarian field today, particularly with the ever-growing participation of private sector stakeholders in the sector. This project is particularly attuned to the role of ‘non-Western’ and ‘global South’ relations in this regard, groups that largely remain unaccounted for empirically and theoretically despite their significant roles (The Gulf, for example, is a case in point: boasting the largest facility for the warehousing and coordination of humanitarian relief supplies globally!). Considering the latter expands understandings of how ‘displacement’ organizes what and who is considered ‘in’ or ‘out’ of place in multiple social orders and contexts beyond groups that are usually analyzed and classified as ‘displaced’. While this project is still at the early development stages, it is anticipated that this research will contribute to more rigorous understandings of the relationship between humanitarianism and mobility, and may ‘disrupt’ assumptions undergirding ‘how aid works’ beyond Global North-South explanations.
Note: This project is still in the development phase and is expected to start on 01.05.2023 with funding from the German Research Foundation.
Duration: 1.3.2021-29.2.2024
Project management: Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling
Project team: Luise Böhm, Paolo Le van, Franca de Graaf
Partners: Dachverband Migrant*innenorganisationen in Ostdeutschland Halle (Saale) (DaMOst), Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus (BTU), German Institute for Saxon History and Folklore Dresden e.V. (ISGV), German Centre for Integration and Migration Research Berlin (DEZIM)
Funding: The project is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research as part of the BMBF's Citizen Research funding programme. It is one of 15 projects that will advance the collaboration of citizens and scientists in terms of content and methodology and provide answers to societal challenges until the end of 2024. Further information at:
https://www.bmbf.de/de/buergerforschung-225.html https://www.buergerschaffenwissen.de/
Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung
Bürgerforschung
MigOst makes the life stories of people with migration histories in eastern Germany visible. The aim of the project is to initiate and reflect on migration and migration-related experiences in eastern Germany in a participatory way together with citizens. Although the GDR and East Germany also have a continuous history of migration, migrant perspectives on the past and present have been marginalised until now. From an everyday perspective, the knowledge and experiences of people with migration histories from the times of the GDR and reunification to the present are to be addressed in the many voices of the narrators. Questions about identity and belonging, about the practice and experience of arriving, staying and leaving, as well as about discrimination and racism can play a role.
How can citizens participate in the research?
The project plans three regular history workshops in Cottbus, Dresden and Halle, in which different methods of group discussion will be used. People with a migration history in East Germany (phase 1) and people who have had migration-related experiences as work colleagues, neighbours or friends in East Germany (phase 2) are invited to participate. The history workshops are developed and conducted jointly by migrant organisations and the project team. Participants do not need any prerequisites other than an interest in the topic. As experts of their own history, the participants themselves decide on the topics; the project team supports them with methodological and theoretical expertise.
Would you like to participate? Then write to us: migost@damost.de
What does the research contribute to?
Hegemonic memory discourses on East German history have large gaps in their perspective and social positioning: GDR society is often imagined as homogeneous and white. The biographies of contract workers or participants in international education programmes, individual migration experiences in the GDR as well as migrant knowledge of the Wende and post-reunification period receive little public attention. In addition, German migration history in research is usually told on the basis of the West German immigration society. In social science, a double differentiation and marginalisation can thus be observed. In reality, of course, East German society has an ongoing history of immigration. By looking back and sharing migration-related experiences, previous exclusions in the culture of memory as well as dominant narratives about East Germany are questioned.
Duration: 1.3.2021-28.2.2023
Project management: Andreas Koth (Internationaler Bund)
Sub-project management: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner, Educational Sciences with a focus on Inclusive Education
Project processing: Tobias Petruschke (M.A.), Ralf Christoph (M.A.)
Project partners:
- Internationaler Bund - IB Mitte gGmbH for Education and Social Services Saxony Branch Office
- Best Institute for Job-Related Further Education and Personal Training GMBH (Austria)
- Profesionalas izglitibas kompetences centrs "Daugavpils tehnikums" (Latvia)
- CEIP "Félix Cuadrado Lomas" (Spain)
Funding: Funded by the European Union
Funded by the European Union
In just three years, as many as 28 billion (digital) devices will be networked worldwide, according to a study of the American network equipment supplier Cisco. Artificial Intelligence (AI), one mega trend of the future within digitisation, is a very advanced element of it. Thanks to built-in algorithms, machines can recognise certain patterns, for example when software "understands" a German sentence and translates it into English. On computers, algorithms filter search results, recommend songs, books and shampoos and block unwanted mail. On the smartphone and tablet, programs wait for voice commands and also register every conversation and change of location very carefully. These are examples from everyday life - but also much larger AI dimensions are reality already. While reports on Wall Street or the German Stock Exchange show nervous stock traders in front of screens, in reality it is algorithms that determine the majority of trading today. Even more uncanny is the development in e.g. China, where a "social credit rating system" collects every click on the net and every time a person crosses a red light in order to sanction or reward the individual afterwards (e.g. with cheaper loans or a block on long-distance travel tickets). And this approach is spreading over to other countries (like Venezuela, Korea ...) due to their business contacts. It is unquestionably digital skills and critical thinking that are among the 21st Century Skills (OECD, EU) that have to be better implemented in school curricula and education within a holistic approach, first to set up a new mind set with educators - critical thinking and ethical principles must be implemented together with digital skills - and secondly to better address the increasing pace of change in work and social life. Certainly, it is difficult "preparing students for jobs and technologies that don’t yet exis, in order to solve problems that we don’t even know are problems yet”, but this should be today’s main task of schools even more than in the past and educators need to be informed and prepared, learners taught accordingly. However, schools in general also need to learn more about business realities and find didactic answers to policy makers‘ guidelines or any lack of them (e.g . "Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI" should be part of ethics classes , as well as more business cases and experimental learning), particularly in countries that do not (yet) belong to AI hot spots, like Austria, Latvia or Spain, partnering in this project with Germany. The ArtIn Future project wants to address these issues by developing, testing and then providing three innovative major outputs to upper primary, secondary and VET schools, teachers and their pupils:
- ArtIn Future - Ethics in Artificial Intelligence – training material to "clean up" with AI myths, show AI differences and ethical principles and empower critical thinking;
- ArtIn Future Digital skills – an experiential training course to develop digital skills for educators working particularly with young (adult) learners exploring "weak" AI (like algorithms that already today read patterns from data sets that humans could never recognise);
- ArtIn Future - AI in the Business world, a OER HUB presenting AI show cases from companies, products designed applying AI, success stories of (female) entrepreneurs in this field to help better understand how companies use AI and which competences are needed to perform these tasks.
These intellectual outcomes will be supported by a variety of management related products and a series of multiplier events during the ArtIn Future Show Case month towards the end of the project implementation. This "roadshow" style of promotion event shall reach at least 110 potential multipliers and mainstreaming participants. The project will directly involve 125 educators - coming from secondary to higher vocational education levels - and 250 of their learners in Germany, Austria, Latvia and Spain and will reach by its foreseen further dissemination activities (like online representation and information) min. 6000 people accross Europe.
The partner organisations, schools and vocational education providers are confident to increase knowledge on Artificial Intelligence, and above all, raise awareness about ethics in this type of knowledge/ business area and in the use of different digital tools, particularly true for girls/ young women.
Duration: 11.1.2020-12.31.2021 (funding phase 1).
From 1.1.20222 (funding phase 2)
Project Management: Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies), Anke Börsel and Julia Welchering (both extension subject DaZ)
Funding: Donors' Association for the Promotion of Sciences and Humanities in Germany
Stifterverband
digiDaz:Pro is a development project of the TU Dresden, which meets the challenges of a changed everyday teaching and learning life in Corona times with digital tools in the course of the expansion of the quite young course German as a Second Language (DaZ). Digital teaching-learning tools are being developed to improve the participation of all students, especially those with DaZ, even under pandemic conditions and with greatly reduced access to interactive language learning offerings. They are conceptually and systematically integrated into the using target group (teachers, students, pupils) in the field of DaZ and thus effective across subjects and phases.
As a cooperative project with local and national partners, it works at the interface of education and science by combining the expertise of actors in the school system with scientifically based findings using the university scientific infrastructure.
Duration: 10.5.2019 - 31.12.2022
Project management: AG NESK
Project partners: Gewerkschaft Erziehung und Wissenschaft Sachsen, Referat Antidiskriminierung, Migration und Internationales; Landesarbeitsgemeinschaft politisch-kulturelle Bildung Sachsen e.V. (Prokubi); Kinder- und Elternzentrum Kolibri e.V. Dresden
The Network Parent-School-Communication (NESK) emerged from a seminar series in the extension subject German as a Second Language at the TU Dresden.
NESK follows two project lines: development and research. In the development line, the network contributes to professionalization and networking in teacher education in the field of continuous language education and migration. In the research line, NESK deals with the means and possibilities of linguistic pedagogical action in the work with parents and family caregivers.
In the target area of teacher training and educational institutions, NESK uses the means of simple and understandable language. In this way, the linguistic prerequisites for successful communication between the actors can be made conscious and developed. For example, the open collection of letters to parents in understandable language has been created, see https://www.gew-sachsen.de/aktuelles/detailseite/sammlung-verstaendlicher-elternbriefe-1/.
The continuity of the exchange of knowledge and experience is ensured by regional network meetings with teachers from different educational sectors. For the representatives from daycare centers, elementary schools, after-school care centers and high schools, the ways of communicating their concerns and information using different communication media are equally important. They form a common field of work that is the focus of the networking meetings. The participants at the last meeting concluded that good communication with parents and family caregivers also benefits the children, which can be felt positively in their daily work.
Duration: 01.08.2018-31.01.2023
Project Management: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner, Chair of Educational Science with focus on Inclusive Education
Qualification Management: Karin Mannewitz
Project Coordination: n.N.
Project Assistance: Laura Schmidt
Funding: The measure is co-financed by tax revenue on the basis of the budget adopted by the members of the Saxon Landtag.
Through the Education Specialists project, people with so-called cognitive impairments are trained as knowledge facilitators for teaching at universities.
The focus of the qualification measure is not on the impairment of the up-and-coming education specialists, but their qualification path and the associated opportunity to use, develop and exploit their individual potential at universities in an unimpeded manner.
As part of the process through which education specialists impart knowledge to students, teachers, experts and managers, examples are given not only of how inclusion can succeed in practice, but also of how it is experienced as a self-evident practice in the learning and teaching process. This actively designed reality permeates all areas of higher education.
The project consciously offers access to an educational institution, that, as a place of education, has an undisputed tradition of exclusion, produced by educational injustices.
Prejudices and various other barriers can be dismantled via the project. A broader awareness at the university for prevailing reasons for exclusion, which are perceived as 'natural' and which are caused by structural inequality and institutional discrimination, will result. Against this broader backdrop of knowledge, these conditions can be identified, analysed and conquered.
In this sense, the project can contribute to the full and effective participation of all university members, since it will significantly change and positively shape assumptions and perspectives on diversity.
The project can be understood as applied research that examines the described mechanisms pertaining to equal opportunity access to higher education, or mechanisms that prevent access to higher education, in order to establish an inclusive structure, culture and practice in academic education, continued education and beyond.
The qualification of the education specialists has begun in February 2019 at TU Dresden. The beginning of the project was 01.08.2018.
The project is being conducted in cooperation with the Institute 'Inclusive Education' of the Christian Albrechts University of Kiel and the University of Leipzig, Faculty of Education, Pedagogy, Intellectual Impairments.
Duration: 01.01.2016-31.03.2023
Projekt coordinator: Elena Bogdanzaliew (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Funding: Deutscher Akademischer Auslandsdienst (German Academic Exchange Service) (Programme: Welcome - Students Helping Refugees)
Sponsored by
The Refugee Law Clinic Dresden trains students to become volunteer student legal advisors and runs a counseling center for refugees at three locations in Dresden.
The Refugee Law Clinic Dresden is part of the DAAD program "Welcome - Students Committed to Refugees", which supports student initiatives that work for the integration of refugees at German universities.
Duration: 01.01.2016-31.03.2023
Project coordinator: Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Funding: Deutscher Akademischer Auslandsdienst (German Academic Exchange Service) (Programme: Welcome - Students Helping Refugees)
Sponsored by
IDA aim's to mediate and coordinate voluntary offers of help from students for refugees as well as the development of structures that contribute to the integration of refugees and to the intercultural exchange between refugees and students in particular and between refugees and all Dresdeners in general. In order to fulfill its tasks, IDA cooperates with other organizations that are also involved in its fields of activity.
Originating from a student group that organized language courses and ABC tables for refugees in the initial reception facilities on the grounds of the TUD from September 2015 to April 2016, IDA today works in four central fields of activity.
1. organization of German language courses with volunteer teachers
2. language courses by refugees for students
3. sponsorship program for refugee students and interested parties
4. political education and sensitization of students
The initiative "IDA - Ankommen in Dresden" is part of the DAAD program "Welcome - Students get involved with refugees", which supports student initiatives that work for the integration of refugees at German universities.
Completed research and transfer projects
Duration: 1.1.2021-31.12.2022
Project Management: Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Scientific Coordinator, Center for Integration Studies), Dr Julia Schulze Wessel (Managing Director, anDemos - Institute for Applied Democracy and Social Research e.V.), Dr Oliviero Angeli (Scientific Coordinator, MIDEM), Prof Dr Michael Kobel (Professor of Particle Physics, Honorary Head of the AG Arbeit und Ausbildung für Geflüchtete im Netzwerk Willkommen in Löbtau e.V. and Board Member Sächsischer Flüchtlingsrat e.V.)
Project Collaboration: Steve Bittner (M.A.)
Cooperation: Kulturbüro Sachsen e.V. (Grit Hanneforth), Richters Buchhandlung (Christine Polak)
Funding: Funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Free State of Saxony within the framework of the Excellence Strategy of the German Federal and State Governments
Society in Dialogue is the continuation of the event series"Vielfalt im Dialog" ("Diversity in Dialogue") from 2020 as part of TU Dresden im Dialog (TU Dresden in Dialogue) - Transfer Activities within the Excellence Strategy of TU Dresden.
Under the title , "Vielfalt im Dialog" ("Diversity in Dialogue") a series of events started at TU Dresden in the fall of 2020, which, together with various civil society cooperation partners*, entered into conversation with a broad Saxon public about topics of migration, integration and racism. In different formats such as an art workshop, readings and panel discussions, new perspectives on topics of the migration society were jointly developed and discussed against the background of current research findings and practical experiences. This series of events will be continued this year under the title "Society in Dialog".
Program & further information can be found on our project website.
Project management: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner, Educational Sciences with focus on Inclusive Education
Project coordination: Dr. Andrea Fischer-Tahir
Project partners: BFW Halle (Saale) gGmbH and German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence - Berlin (DFKI)
Funding: Deutsche Rentenversicherung
Digitisation in the functional system of the economy as well as the neo-liberal restructuring of the market and the state pose specific challenges for blind and visually impaired people.
Vocational training and rehabilitation deals with the question how to adapt jobs for people with visual impairments or how digital skills and abilities can be taught more effectively through qualification. At the same time "Arbeit 4.0" also requires Learning 4.0, i.e. digitisation in the context of competence development: distance learning; remote learning via the Internet or online courses. The project examines barriers arising from the interaction between economy and society and health and employment biographies. The project analyses the social pre-structuring, design and consequences of vocational rehabilitation interventions.
With the help of focus group discussions and narrative interviews as well as a research approach guided by german-speaking Critical Disability Education, interpretive sociology and practical theory, the project advocates treating the inclusion of visually impaired actors not as a question of "needs" and "measures" but as a question of social justice.
Duration: 01.01.2018-31.12.2020
Project manager: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner
Alliance partners: Anzhela Preissler, Fraunhofer Center for International Management and Knowledge Economy Leipzig; Prof. Dr. Carolin Frank, Bergische Universität Wuppertal, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Safety Technology, Mechanical Engineering
Project members: Prof. Dr. Anja Besand, David Jugel, Judith Jung, Prof. Dr. Petra Kemter-Hofmann, Prof. Dr. Thomas Köhler, Prof. Dr. Rolf Koerber, Clemens Milker, Prof. Dr. Manuela Niethammer, Marlis Pesch, Annekathrin Pollmann, Prof. Dr. Marcus Schütte, Jan Steffens, Katrin Wesemeyer, Prof. Dr. Dorothee Wieser
Funding: Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung
The SING project connects specialist and occupational didactics with special education didactics in order to establish competences for the development of inclusive teaching as part of teacher training studies. Through this inclusive teaching, each individual pupil will be supported and empowered in their development. For this purpose, the more theoretical approaches of the vocational or subject-didactic development of learning environments will be combined with empirical approaches of case-based, research-based learning. A tool will be developed by which the subject-specific diagnostics of the learners' learning status can be combined with the subject-specific or occupational didactic analysis of the material to be mastered. It will then be possible to produce learning environments based on this. The didactically developed learning environment will be supported by educational technology and made available to all participants via a responsive learning platform. Learning results will also be recorded and evaluated for an assessment of the learning status and for counselling during the process.
Students examine, develop and evaluate teaching-learning settings that establish and develop universities and schools as places for inclusive learning. They are supervised by professional teams of lecturers from the fields of didactics and special education. The competences of the students will be collected and analysed during the process/project in order to be able to ascertain the effectiveness of the measure with regard to the development of teaching competences for inclusive specialist teaching and in order to be able to quickly implement adaptations into the teaching concept.
SING focuses on the micro level of educational design. However, the development of pedagogical programmes is not sustainable without developments at the school level – in this respect, SING is analysing the process management requirements for the organisation of inclusive schools in participating schools and is developing a pilot organisation model 'inclusive school'.
Project Management: Prof. Dr. Sarah Hägi-Mead (Institute for Educational Research, Bergische Universität Wuppertal), Dr. Beatrice Müller (Institute for German Studies, University of Vienna), Prof. Dr. Hannes Schweiger (Institute for German Studies, University of Vienna), Dr. Michael Dobstadt (Professorship for German as a Foreign Language & Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden), Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies)
Project Partners: University of Wuppertal, University of Vienna
In recent years, in view of the problem of discrimination against children from "educationally disadvantaged classes" and with a "migration background", the term "language of education" (Gogolin 2009) has become a key concept in the discourse on school and education. In the lecture series, this term is not only to be reflected and justified in its meaning in terms of language and educational policy, but it is also to be discussed and explored above all in its dazzling wealth of facets, its - also ideological - charge, its linguistic underdeterminedness, its lack of empirical foundation and, last but not least, its ambivalence.
When we talk about "language of education" on the one hand we are talking about granting or denying access to social resources through language. On the other hand, it is about a related understanding of language, about an understanding of the relationship between language and subject, and thus about a bundle of hitherto hardly understood conceptualisations, attributions, narratives and finally also practices. These need to be critically reflected upon and better understood. For they constitute educational language as an enormously powerful construct in various educational contexts. Its potential is to be seen not least in drawing attention to the importance of language in the educational process. In order to take this into account, the concept of language of education appears to be linked with the concept of language education in the context of this lecture series. What is implied is that language education can be a task not only of schools, but must be a task of all educational institutions: from elementary education to higher education. The cooperation of the respective educational institutions with other actors* and institutions plays an important role in this context. Language education is understood as the task of all those involved in educational processes and accordingly requires interdisciplinary approaches, as discussed in this lecture series.
Further information here: http://www.tu-dresden.de/zfi/bildungssprachen
Duration: 01.07.2020-31.12.2020
Project Management: Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling, Dr Julia Schulze Wessel, Dr Oliviero Angeli, Prof Dr Michael Kobel, Grit Hanneforth
Project Coordination: Steve Bittner
Project Partners: anDemos e.V., Kulturbüro Sachsen e.V.
Funding: Funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the Free State of Saxony within the framework of the Excellence Strategy of the Federal Government.
"Vielfalt im Dialog" is the name of a series of events at the TU Dresden. The project aims together with various civil society cooperation partners to engage in dialogue with a broad public on migration issues in autumn / winter 2020. With different formats such as an art workshop, readings and panel discussions, new perspectives on topics of the migration society are discussed together. The series of events is conceived and organised by the "Migration and Integration" Thematic Circle of the TU Dresden, which is part of the future laboratory "FAKE SCIENCE? Wissenschaft zwischen gesellschaftlicher Verantwortung und Skepsis" (June 2019), and two non-university institutions: anDemos - Institute for Applied Democracy and Social Research and the Kulturbüro Sachsen e.V.: Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies), Dr Julia Schulze Wessel (anDemos e.V.), Prof Dr Michael Kobel (Chair of Particle Physics, Welcome to Löbtau e.V., Sächsischer Flüchtlingsrat e.V.), Dr Oliviero Angeli (MIDEM, Institute for Political Science), Grit Hanneforth (Kulturbüro Sachsen e.V.). The series of events is supported by the initiative "TU Dresden im Dialog" within the framework of the excellence strategy. The events will be mainly digital and can be accessed at: www.tu-dresden.de/exzellenz/vielfalt-im-dialog
Duration: 01.08.2016-31.07.2020
Project management: Laura Rind-Menzel
Funding: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative of the German Federal and State Governments), Saxon State Ministry for Science and Arts
With the increase in the number of immigrants especially in the past five years, numerous educational offers have been given to migrants. Those offers should contribute to the social and political participation of immigrants as future citizens of the Federal Republic. Additionally, they should also provide support for the orientation and integration process in German society.
The main subjects of the research project are integration courses and their materials (such as textbooks, curricula and teacher handouts), as well as explanatory videos and brochures, which are made available for the arrival and the naturalization in Germany. These offers are focussing political, social, and cultural issues, which might be of central importance to immigrants and their process of becoming a citizen in Germany / gaining German citizenship.
From the perspective of civic education, the research project investigates to what extent the named offers can make an appropriate contribution to the promotion of political and social participation. In spite of their best intentions, do the offers possibly have certain characteristics that counteract the participation of immigrated people? The investigation therefore focusses on the question of how the supply-immanent education processes are designed for a culturally heterogeneous user or target group. The integration and arrival experiences, as well as the perspectives and needs of migrants are also included in the research process out of interviews. After all, the contents, ways, and means offered to immigrants become the usual "offer of citizenship" of political education and its ideas about participation.
Duration: 01.09.2016-01.10.2020
Project managment: Dr. Carolin Eckardt (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Funding: Institutional Strategy of TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative by the German Federal and State Governments), Saxon State Ministry for Science and Arts
In her research project Carolin Eckardt studies the functionalization of competence in practical contexts of integration. In particular, the influence of the specific constructions of (professional and linguistic) competence on processes of social inclusion and exclusion shall be investigated in various areas of integration.
Duration: 01.07.2017-30.06.2020
Projekt management: Dr. Torsten Andreas, Anke Börsel (German as a second language, TU Dresden), Frank Beier (ZLSB, TU Dresden)
Projekt members: N.N.
Funding: Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft
Language acquisition is the central prerequisite for integration. Currently, the under-25s represent the largest group among new immigrants, which is a novelty in Germany's migration history since 1945. The Free State of Saxony has therefore increasingly opened preparatory classes at general and vocational schools, for which professional actors are necessary. The TU Dresden established the extension subject German as a Second Language (DaZ) on 1.10.2016 for the training of teachers, as the demand for qualified DaZ teachers in the Free State of Saxony cannot be met.
With the start of the extension subject German as a Second Language in the winter semester 2016/17, the basis for a well-founded training of student teachers of all subject areas and school types has been created. The curriculum of the extension subject takes up the basic idea of the Saxon concept for the integration of migrants, which can be located in the approach of language education as an integrated part of subject teaching.
The project „Spracherwerb im Spannungsfeld interkultureller pädagogischer Beziehungen“ contributes to raising the profile of the DaZ extension subject and, in particular, to the development and testing of a curricular core module for the curriculum at Dresden University of Technology, differentiated according to age and type of school.
Stifterverband für die Deutsche Wissenschaft (2019): Lehrkräftebildung für die
Schule der Vielfalt. Professioneller Umgang mit Migration und Mehrsprachigkeit. Eine Handreichung des Netzwerks Stark durch Diversität. Essen (Available online here).
Duration: 01.11.2017 - 31.10.2019
Project management: Ann-Kathrin Kobelt (Centre for Integration Studies, TU Dresden), Dr. Michael Dobstadt (Chair of German as a Foreign Language, TU Dresden)
Project collaboration: Frauke Al Mohammad, Dr. Solveig Buder, Michael Rollberg
Cooperation partners: Jugend - Arbeit- Bildung e.V.; Die Sprachwerkstatt Dresden
Language, knowledge and skills pave the way for access to education, training and work. This also applies to (new) immigrants. Due to changes in the framework conditions of the integration courses since 2015, the existing regulations and mechanisms must be reviewed. Therefore, stakeholders from the fields of mediation and acquisition of the German language, (further) education and work were called upon to identify challenges and problems in a bottom-up process and to jointly identify concrete approaches to solutions. These recommendations for action are a synthesis of the enormous need for discussion, education and action identified at the Deutsch für Geflüchtete von Anfang an symposium (ZfI, September 2017) and the information event Deutsch lernen in Dresden (LHD, October 2017). As a follow-up to these two events, the challenges, problems and approaches to solutions will be bundled, examined and written down. With the recommendations for action, the leaders and contributors want to make their voices heard and gain support from relevant actors at various levels.
Duration: 01.09.2016-31.08.2019
Project management: Ann-Kathrin-Kobelt (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Promotion: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative by the German Federal and State Governments), Saxon State Ministry for Science and Arts
SprINTERgration – Positions between languages by Community Interpreter (SprInt) in Germany
Ann-Kathrin Kobelt, a PhD candidate at the Center for Integration Studies, is currently analyzing interviews with Community Interpreter (CI, in German: Sprach- und Integrationsmittelnde, SprInt). In this context, she operates the Documentary Method.
Focusing on perception of languages and especially on the term »integration«, she collects and highlights the effects as well as the impacts of CI on languages in integration procedures. Following this spirit, she also focuses on strangeness and idiosyncrasy as well as consequential hegemonies.
The objective of this fundamental research is to reconstruct the position of in-between; especially those in-between languages in integration procedures. The obtained results are represented by available discourses, practices, and research methodologies in integration that could be deliberated and utilized in both the academic and educational field of German as a foreign language (DaF) and German as second language (DaZ).
Duration:
10.04.2019-08.10.2019
Project management:
Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center of Integration Studies, TU Dresden), Dr Noa K. Ha
Project partners:
Anna Nikolenko, Irina Grünheid, Bozzi Schmidt, Carolin Eckardt, Rico Ehren, Almut Gelenava, Nora Zeising, Huda El Husein, Sebastian Seelig, Peggy Piesche, Katja Kinder, Rico Schwibs, Robert Enge
Cooperation partners:
- Thinking ahead - Heinrich Böll Foundation Saxony
- Education and Science Trade Union (GEW), Saxony
- CMC - Center for Migration, Education and Cultural Studies at the University of Oldenburg
- Anti-discrimination office (ADB) Saxony e. V.
- Foreigners' Council Dresden e. V., Project 'Overcoming borders
- IN VIA Catholic Association for Girls' and Women's Social Work Diocesan Association Dresden-Meißen e.V.
- State capital Dresden - Education and Youth Division - Youth Welfare Office
- Support for victims of right-wing, racist and anti-Semitic violence / RAA Sachsen e. V.
The number of racist attacks has fallen again after a massive increase. Nevertheless, racist violence and racist verbal abuse persist and do not stop at the campus. Therefore: Racism concerns us all - but what to do? The events of "Courage: Know, See, Act" provide answers to these questions and offer options for action.
Know! What is racism? How does it make itself felt? In which contexts does it occur? What is the history of racism? What can a university do against racism? The lectures by and discussions with experts help to recognise and understand racism.
See! How is racism negotiated in art and culture? Can art and culture give a voice to those affected by racism and discrimination? Which thought processes can (only) be initiated by artistic-cultural practice? Numerous cultural events in cooperation with Dresden art and educational institutions invite a change of perspective.
Act! What can I do if I am a victim or witness*to a racist attack? What can I do? How do I argue against right-wing slogans in a quick-witted way? How do I deal with racism as a person affected*? Workshops provide answers and practical tips.
Part of the series of events this year was the lecture series "Inklusive Schule in der Migrationsgesellschaft. Handelnde Teilhabe für alle, aber wie?"
Duration: 01.04.-30.09.2019
Project Management: Dr Noa K. Ha, Anna Nikolenko (LAG pokuBi Sachsen e.V.), Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project Members: Irina Grünheid, Bozzi Schmidt, Carolin Eckardt, Rico Ehren, Nora Zeising, Huda El Husein, Almut Gelenava
Funding: "Migration-Flight-Education. Bildungsorte einer öffnenden Stadt" is funded by the Saxon State Ministry of Social Affairs and Consumer Protection from funds of the Integrative Measures Directive.
Schools in Dresden and Saxony are faced with the task of becoming inclusive schools, i.e. realising the right of education without discrimination. The institution school in the migration society is thus challenged to review and adapt existing regulations, routines and the relationship between the prerequisites of the pupils and institutional expectations and offers. However, the situation at schools is characterised by a serious structural lack of teaching staff and resources, which makes it more difficult to cope with everyday school life than to support the new challenges.
The ZfI and LAG pokuBi e.V. organised a lecture series in the summer term 2019 under the title "Inklusive Schule in der Migrationsgesellschaft-Handelnde Teilhabe für alle, aber wie? " ("Inclusive School in the Migration Society - Active Participation for All, but How?").
In seven varied and well-attended sessions, speakers, commentators and an audience consisting of students, academic experts and the interested practical public dealt with the school as an inclusive place in the migration society. The challenge of critically reviewing the existing order of the institution of school in the migration society and pointing out perspectives for improvement was thus addressed.
The lecture series was open to the academic audience and the interested public.
The lecture series took place within the framework of this year's series of events "Courage: Know, See, Act! 2019".
Duration: 01.06.2018-31.05.2019
Project manager: Prof. Dr. Heike Greschke
Project members: Janine Kläffling, Leandro Raszkewicz, Viktoria Rösch, Lukas Schmitz, Moutaz Zafer
Funding: Sächsisches Staatsministerium für Wissenschaft und Kunst
This measure is co-financed by tax resources based on the budget decided by the parliamentarians of the Saxon State Parliament.
The project "Art and Culture in the Polarized City" takes the overall social tendencies of social division and the increase in conflictual discursive disputes that have become apparent in recent years as an opportunity to examine the significance of art and culture in the process of social understanding. With the public appearance of PEGIDA since late 2014, a process of polarization has
a process of polarization began in Dresden, which was intensified by the reactions to the arrival of a comparatively large number of refugees in 2015. Opposing, mutually reinforcing collective positions formed, centered on the poles of "welcome culture" on the one hand and "fear of foreign infiltration" on the other. As the cradle and stage of the PEGIDA movement, Dresden is therefore placed at the center of the analysis as a 'polarization laboratory', since it is here that media-enhanced processes of transition from individual experiences of disadvantage to collective public protest, its discursive overwriting with ethnocentric to racist motifs, and the formation of a counter-movement have been realized in condensed form. How this process has affected the (political) positioning and self-image of Dresden's art and cultural institutions and what role or positions they take in the process of social understanding is the subject of the present project, thus contributing to the determination of the potentials and limits of art and culture as cohesion-creating mediating instances.
The research project is divided into two subprojects. SP 1 records and examines Dresden's art and cultural landscape in the period 2014-2017 with regard to changing self-understandings, mediation claims and concepts, as well as (political) self- and external positioning in the polarized city. SP 2 examines processes of social polarization and investigates the conditions, potentials and limits of the mediation of art and cultural institutions exemplarily on the basis of a supra-regionally significant exhibition on a topic that is capable of calling up potentially conflicting positions (in Dresden's urban society). For this purpose, the mediation, appropriation and reception process will be analyzed in-situ with ethnographic and discourse-analytical methods.
On 22nd May 2019, representatives of institutions for culture and arts in Dresden and its surroundings were invited to the final workshop of the KupoS project. The project was carried out at the ZfI from 1st June 2018 until 31st May 2019 under the leadership of Prof Heike Greschke.
It evaluated the role and the (changing) self-image of cultural institutions, as well as the limits of social positionings and their effects on the social cohesion within the society of Dresden. Based on the question, which resonances PEGIDA created in the Dresden landscape of culture and arts, the project examined the operating modes and logics of polarisation as engines and markers of social transformations. Another question was, to what extent institutions for culture and arts are able to and responsible for the mediation between antagonistic positions.
The KupoS-Team presented four theses about polarisation and the role of arts and culture, which were developed based on the results of the projects, and which were to be discussed by actors of the local landscape of culture and arts. The workshop’s aim was to open up a perspective on the institutional artistic and cultural (mediation) practice, which shows abstract and general structures and processes. In doing so, the results of the project were not presented as better but as reflected knowledge. The deliberately provocative theses “Polarisation is worthwhile”, “Polarisation motivates”, “Polarisation politicises and polarises”, and “Polarisation unifies through separation” were presented and explained by the project members Leandro Raszkewicz, Viktoria Rösch, Lukas Schmitz, and Moutaz Zafer. After this, the about 30 participants had the possibility to discuss these theses. The results were presented and discussed together. This discussion was documented by Anja Maria Eisen via graphic recording.
This visual protocol conveys a good impression of this emotional discussion. There was disagreement concerning the question, for whom and in which respect polarisation is worthwhile, or to what extent the short-term economic success in attention because of publicly resolved controversies, or the clear positioning could also harm the organiser in the medium term. The participants agreed in the assumption that the mission of mediation of arts and culture includes the creation of possibilities to acquire and practice tolerance for ambivalence. Furthermore, the theses allowed it to think about new forms of mediation, which are able to alleviate dynamics of polarisation by drawing attention to differences and inconsistencies within alleged poles, and by placing topics, which emphasise partial commonalities between positions that are perceived as antagonistic and thus can create possibilities for cooperation.
Further details on the results of the project and the workshop can soon be found in the final report of the project.
Duration: 1.10.2018-31.01.2019
Organizer: Chair of German as a Foreign Language, TU Dresden and Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden
Cooperation partners: Institute for Educational Research at the University of Wuppertal and the Institute for German Studies at the University of Vienna.
Funding: The lecture series was funded by the Faculty of Language, Literature and Cultural Studies, TU Dresden and the Gesellschaft von Freunden und Fördereren der TU Dresden e. V.
Internationalization, globalization and migration have made European societies more multilingual. As is well known, this development is discussed controversially. On the one hand, it triggers fears of (over)alienation; it is feared that multilingualism cognitively overtaxes young migrants and hinders their integration; it poses enormous (ideological as well as practical) problems for the educational institutions that are confronted with it. On the other hand, language acquisition research emphasizes that individual multilingualism is an important cognitive-creative resource that is still too little appreciated; and linguistics points out that societal multilingualism - represented not only by minority and migration languages, but also by the coexistence of national and regional varieties, of written and spoken language - is only apparently the exception, but in reality linguistic normality. This is said to have been lost sight of only because this social multilingualism was not recognized for a long time or was even suppressed - under the sign of a nationally motivated linguistic homogenization, the origins of which reach far back into the early modern period. From the perspective of language policy, it can be added that the European Union is in principle positively disposed toward linguistic diversity and promotes it; however, it restricts itself to a few (supposedly) high-value languages, whereas the actual migration languages receive much less attention or appreciation. This can lead to the paradoxical situation that the "monolingual habitus" (Gogolin 1994) of the (German) school system, which was already diagnosed more than twenty years ago, has hardly changed until today, while in academia the individual languages are increasingly being displaced by English; both are problematic and not forward-looking.
Against the backdrop of this complex panorama, the lecture series wants to look at "multilingualism" from different perspectives as a multi-layered and controversial topic; the guiding keywords for this are "diversity as opportunity" - "diversity as challenge" (Jessner/Kramsch 2015).
Under the sign of "diversity as opportunity", multilingualism is to be thematized as an opportunity, i.e. as a semiotic resource that multiplies access to and perspectives on reality; as a cognitive-creative resource that manifests itself in new urban dialects, in "linguistic wormhole(s)" (Hinrichs), in codeswitching and codemixing; and not least in literature.
"Diversity as challenge", on the other hand, means the challenges of institutions and the views and routines sedimented in them, of the well-rehearsed (linguistic) hierarchies and balances of power, of the common homogeneous concept of language; the fear, however, also of fragmentation, incommunicability and loss of (cultural) identity, to which, in turn, new linguistic essentialisms are reacted. Special attention will be paid to the educational institutions (= school/university): What does it mean for them when society becomes linguistically more and more diverse?
Duration: 1st August 2018 – 31st December 2018
Project management: Dr Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project staff: Rico Ehren, Timo Kracht, Carola Queitsch, Sarah Schückel, Helena Uthoff
Cooperation partners: Center for Continuing Education (TU Dresden)
Funding: Proactive budget of the Saxon state ministry for science and arts, local action programme for a diverse and cosmopolitan Dresden (LHP) of the state capital Dresden
Event series between August and December 2018
The number of racist violence has decreased after a massive increase last year. Nevertheless, racist violence and racial verbal violations continue to exist and do not stop at the campus. Therefore, racism affects us all - but what can be done? The events of "Courage: Know, See, Act!" try to give answers and offer action possibilities.
Know! What is racism? Under which circumstances does it arise? What history has racism? What can a university do against racism? The lectures of and discussions with experts help to understand and identify racism.
See! How is racism negotiated in art and culture? Can art and culture give a voice to those affected by racism and discrimination? Which thinking processes can (only) be initiated by the artistic-cultural practice? Many events in cooperation with Dresden's culture and education institutions invite to change the own point of view.
Act! What can I do if I was a victim or a witness of a racial motivated attack? What am I allowed to do? How can I answer xenophobic phrases eloquently? How to deal with racism as an affected person? The workshops inform about answers and give advice.
Duration: 01.09.2017-30.04.2018
Project managment: Prof. Dr. Heike Greschke (Institute of Sociology, Centre for Integration Studies, TU Dresden), Overall project: PD Dr. Steffen Kailitz (Research Network on Integration, Xenophobia, and right-wing Extremism in Saxony; Hannah Arendt Institute, TU Dresden)
Projekt members: Moutaz Zafer, Lisa-Marie Klett, Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling
Funding: Saxon State Ministry for Science and Arts
Researching two closely intertwined sets of issues - on the one hand, integration processes in the German and Saxon immigrant society, and on the other hand, right-wing extremist and xenophobic disintegration processes that endanger democratic cohesion - is the goal of the project "Democratic Cohesion in Saxony" (DeZiS).
As part of the overall project, the Center for Integration Studies (TU Dresden) is conducting an exploratory study in the thematic area of "Labor Market Integration and Social Cohesion." The research project examines the extent to which structures and practices of decision-making, participation and cooperation in Saxon companies change with the employment of refugees and the "interculturalization" of existing teams. The focus of the explorative study is on companies that currently employ interns, trainees and workers with refugee or unclear status.
What are the experiences of companies that employ refugees in their teams? What happens when new work and cooperation cultures meet in the team? How do social structures and practices of cooperation, decision-making and participation change when working with refugees? How does the concrete cooperation between companies and employees with and without a refugee background take shape? What challenges and obstacles arise in the process of "interculturalization" of teams, especially under difficult conditions of cooperation (e.g. limited linguistic understanding, lack of specialized training, different professional socialization, corporate and cooperation cultures, resentment/racism in the company, etc.)? What strategies and practices are there to (creatively) react to this and to benefit from experiences made with it (e.g. implementation/promotion of multilingualism/dialogue, strengthening of intercultural competences, tolerance of ambiguity, reduction of racist resentments)? Which actors, institutions, (local/civil society) networks, etc. are involved in accompanying and supporting these teams beyond the company?
The explorative study focuses on the one hand on actors from the company and team management, and on the other hand on employees with refugee or unclear status. Access to companies that have already hired refugees and have relevant experience is supported by the association "Wirtschaft für ein weltoffenes Sachsen" e. V. (Business for a Saxony open to the world); in addition, other companies identified through the research as well as company documents (personnel development, diversity concepts, etc.) will be explored. In addition, the focus will be on the perspective of the refugee employees; with the help of professional biographical interviews and ethnographic methods of everyday support, initial analyses of cooperation and participation practices will be carried out.
Duration: 01.10.2017-31.03.2018
Organizer: Center for Integration Studies at the TU Dresden in cooperation with the Chair of German as a Foreign Language at the TU Dresden.
Cooperation partner: Institute for Educational Research at the University of Wuppertal and the Institute for German Studies at the University of Vienna.
Funding: The lecture series was funded by the Faculty of Language, Literature and Cultural Studies of the TU Dresden and by funds from the 2014 Teaching Award of the Society of Friends and Sponsors of the TU Dresden e. V. to Dr. Ulrich Zeuner, Chair of German as a Foreign Language, TU Dresden
Social power relations are concrete and realize themselves in immediate relationships between people. In every interaction between people, power asymmetries, hierarchies, privileges, status, dominance culture and marginalization play a role. What this means in relation to language(s) was the topic of this interdisciplinary and international roundtable event organized by the Chair of German as a Foreign Language at the TU Dresden in cooperation with the ZfI. The target group included (prospective) teachers and educators, who belong to the group of people who are superior in power in relation to children and adolescents and whose values and normative orientations prove to be very influential. Power shows itself, among other things, in the use and handling of language(s). For this reason, it seemed important to reflect on oneself as a linguistic agent, especially in the pedagogical context. The perspectives and disciplines from which this took place deliberately went beyond German studies, DaF/DaZ and cultural studies and included political and mathematical education, biblical theology, Slavic studies, migration education and educational science. The course was designed to allow ample space for reflection: Each session featured two 45-minute input lectures, with an additional 45 minutes available for discussion.
View the poster of the lecture series here.
Duration: 01.06.2017-31.12.2017
Project management: Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project collaboration: Sita Buchberger, Rico Ehren, Jana Höhnisch, Ann-Kathrin Kobelt, Timo Kracht, Laura Rind-Menzel, Katharina Tietze, Helena Uthoff, Moutaz Zafer
Cooperation: We Care (Prorectorate Education and International TU Dresden, Center for Continuing Education TU Dresden)
Funding: Initiative Budget 2017 of the Saxon State Ministry for Science and Art
Event series between October and December 2017
The number of racist violence has decreased after a massive increase last year. Nevertheless, racist violence and racial verbal violations continue to exist and do not stop at the campus. Therefore, racism affects us all - but what can be done? The events of "Courage: Know, See, Act!" try to give answers and offer action possibilities.
Know! What is racism? Under which circumstances does it arise? What history has racism? What can a university do against racism? The lectures of and discussions with experts help to understand and identify racism.
See! How is racism negotiated in art and culture? Can art and culture give a voice to those affected by racism and discrimination? Which thinking processes can (only) be initiated by the artistic-cultural practice? Many events in cooperation with Dresden's culture and education institutions invite to change the own point of view.
Act! What can I do if I was a victim or a witness of a racial motivated attack? What am I allowed to do? How can I answer xenophobic phrases eloquently? How to deal with racism as an affected person? The workshops inform about answers and give advice.
Duration: 01.10.-31.12.2017
Project Management: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner (Institute of Educational Science, Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project collaboration: Katharina Tietze
Client: Kolibri e. V.
The cooperation between migrant self-organizations (MSO's) and daycare centers in the field of early childhood education is one of the goals of the project "Intercultural Education Landscape", which was carried out by the child and parent center Kolibri e. V.. Due to factors such as globalization and the refugee situation, diversity in daycare centers is increasing, and with it the need for knowledge transfer and cooperation between MSOs and daycare centers.
The dialogue between these two institutions was the focus of the symposium. Inspired by examples of good practice, the possibilities of cooperation between MSOs and daycare centers in Dresden and the surrounding area were to be discussed. Space for exchange of experience and knowledge on everyday topics such as different educational expectations, values, norms, language promotion concepts and intercultural forms of learning for children was offered in the form of various workshops.
The Center for Integration Studies documented the symposium and conducted a questionnaire study on the potentials of cooperation between MSOs and daycare centers.
Duration: 23.09.2017
Project Management: Dr. Sara Hägi-Mead, Ann-Kathrin Kobelt (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Project collaboration: Rico Ehren
Funding: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative of the German Federal and State Governments), Society of Friends and Sponsors of the TU Dresden (Teaching Award Dr. Ulrich Zeuner)
The 2nd symposium "Deutsch für Geflüchtete von Anfang an" (German for Refugees from the Beginning) creates an interface between voluntary and institutional language (learning) programs by systematically relating experience and research knowledge to each other. A day of structured exchange between volunteer language (learning) facilitators, refugees, (prospective) scholars from the fields of German as a Foreign Language (DaF) and German as a Second Language (DaZ), (prospective) teachers of German as a Foreign Language (DaF) and German as a Second Language (DaZ) as well as contact persons from politics, administration and business will be offered. How does the exchange between actors of language (education) work in voluntary work, institutions and science take place? Which topics are relevant and which recommendations for action can be implemented?
Duration: 03.07.-07.07.2017
Project Management: Dr. Sara Hägi-Mead, Prof. Dr. Friedrich Funke (Faculty of Education, TU Dresden)
Project Members: Sita Buchberger, Rico Ehren, Jana Höhnisch, Ann-Kathrin Kobelt, Timo Kracht, Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling, Laura Rind-Menzel, Katharina Tietze, Helena Uthoff, Moutaz Zafer
Funding: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative of the Federal and State Governments)
One of the greatest tasks facing society as a whole in Germany, the country of immigration, is the integration of people of all affiliations (ethnicity, age, gender, etc.) into a society that is understood to be inclusive, especially the challenge of using and promoting the potential of a pluralistic society. A society that is open to different diversities is the focus of so-called post-migrant approaches which direct the perspective away from migration towards the resulting processes - social and political transformations, conflicts and identity constructions. The topic of integration and work in the post-migrant society is of enormous importance in this context since it is here that social participation is essentially made possible and, in view of the shortage of skilled workers and demographic developments, the development of the labour market can also be improved. In order to discuss relevant practices and concepts in detail, the Summer School dealt intensively with the topic of integration with a special focus on the (further) development of structures and processes of vocational training and employment under the condition of diversity.
Duration: 01.02.2017-30.06.2017
Project Management: Dr. Sara Hägi-Mead (Center for Integration Studies, Dresden University of Technology)
Project Collaborators: Prof. Dr. Anke Langner (Chair of Educational Science with a focus on inclusive education, Technische Universität Dresden); Dr. Carolin Eckardt (Center for Integration Studies, Technische Universität Dresden), Prof. Dr. Hans Vorländer (Chair of Political Theory and History of Ideas, Technical University of Dresden), Dr. Oliviero Angeli (Chair of Political Theory and History of Ideas, Technical University of Dresden), Prof. Dr. Christoph Enders (Chair of Public Law, Political and Constitutional Theory, University of Leipzig), Akad. Ass. Dr. Anna Mrozek (Chair of Public Law, Political and Constitutional Studies, University of Leipzig), Jonas Püschmann (Chair of Public Law, Political and Constitutional Studies, University of Leipzig)
Project Coordination: Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling (Center for Integration Studies, Technical University of Dresden)
Funding: Saxon State Ministry for Social Affairs and Consumer Protection, Equality and Integration Division
The purpose of the evaluation project was to elicit and discuss the need, prerequisites and implementation possibilities of such a set of regulations and to develop concrete recommendations for a Saxon integration law.
In order to evaluate the need for a Saxon integration law, the project group, led and coordinated by the Center for Integration Studies, defined the following areas of investigation: 1. analysis and discussion of existing regulations, state and federal legal foundations and studies/statistics on the integration of people with a migration background in Saxony; 2. Analysis and discussion of existing state integration laws (Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Berlin, North Rhine-Westphalia); 3. Definition and description of fields of action of Saxon state policy that are essential for integration, i.e. fields and topics where legal regulations would be necessary and useful.
The need for a Saxon integration law was evaluated from three perspectives: educational science, political science and law.
The report was published in the series "Praxismaterialien des Zentrums für Integrationsstudien" and is available for download here.
Duration: 01.010.2016-31.03.2017
Organised by the International Office of the Humanities and Social Sciences Department.
In cooperation with the Center of Integration Studies.
The number of racist attacks in Dresden has increased massively in recent years. Students and staff of the TU Dresden are also affected by this - occasionally even on campus. Racism concerns us all - but what to do? The events of "Courage: Know, See, Act!" provided answers to these questions.
Workshops: What can I do if I become a victim or witness* of a racist attack? What can I do? How do I argue against right-wing slogans in a quick-witted way? How do I deal with racism as a victim? The workshops provided answers and practical tips.
Lectures: What is racism? In which contexts does it occur? What can a university do against racism? The lectures by well-known experts helped to understand and recognise racism.
Readings, films, poetry slam: numerous events in cooperation with Dresden cultural and educational institutions invited a change of perspective.
The programme can be reached here.
Duration: Winter semester 2016/17
Project Management: Dr. Ina Krause (Institute of Sociology, TU Dresden)
Cooperation partners: Kunsthaus Dresden, Societaetstheater, Faculty of Economics, Saxon State Library - Dresden State and University Library (SLUB)
Project collaboration: Dr. Karoline Oehme-Jüngling, Laura Rind-Menzel (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Funding: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative of the German Federal and State Governments), Saxon State Ministry for Science and the Arts
With the lecture series, the Center for Integration Studies dealt with current perspectives of migration and integration research. The lecture series was aimed at students and staff of the TU Dresden and other academic and public institutions in the city and was open to all those interested in the topic.
The lecture series "Europe in Flux - Perspectives on Migration and Cultural Change in Europe" of the Center for Integration Studies (ZfI) took place in cooperation with the Kunsthaus Dresden, the Societaetstheater, the Faculty of Economics and the Saxon State Library - Dresden State and University Library (SLUB). The Center for Integration Studies (ZfI) was supported by funds from the Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden, funded by the Excellence Initiative of the German Federal and State Governments, and supported by the Saxon State Ministry for Science and the Arts (SMWK).
Duration: 26.08.2016
Project Management: Dr. Anja Centeno-García (TU Dresden)
Project Collaboration: Rico Ehren, Ann-Kathrin Kobelt (Center for Integration Studies, TU Dresden)
Funding: Institutional Strategy of the TU Dresden (Excellence Initiative of the German Federal Government and the German Federal States), Saxon State Ministry for Science and the Arts
Teaching German to refugees is a special challenge. Particularly in the first weeks of their stay, refugees are offered language learning opportunities by volunteers, mostly lay people, in a variety of forms. The volunteer practitioners now have extensive experience with the target group. In addition, attempts at self-organized professionalization without being tied back to professional discourses show that outdated or inappropriate emphases/principles dominate in some cases (for example, a focus on grammar) .
The commitment is thus great, but the specific expertise is scattered, unknown and incomplete on both the volunteer and professional side, especially with regard to the work with and by volunteers, the design of transfer and differentiation, and the specifics of the teaching situation. Above all, the transitions between initial language or lay support and institutionalized DaF/DaZ instruction are often uncoordinated.
The symposium was intended as a contribution to the systematization and foundation of German lessons for refugees in the first months of their stay in Germany. The aim was to make lived German practice visible and to bring it into dialogue with professional approaches, theory as well as research in order to further develop structures, teaching principles and approaches appropriately for the specifics of the target group on this basis.
The goals have been:
- Coordination of expertise from theory and practice
- professionalization of the interfaces between voluntary work and well-founded DaF/DaZ teaching
- joint development of practical solutions
- Identification of research needs