Current PhD Projects:

Ioannis Theocharis: Path-dependent consumption cultures

In the discourse on socio-ecological transformation, the concept of imperial lifestyles is used to describe the everyday activities of people who are dependent on the unlimited use of resources, a disproportionate claim on global and local ecosystems and the exploitation of cheap labor. The availability of these goods is organized by the global market, which in turn is maintained by military interventions and asymmetric power relations (Brand & Wissen, 2015)

A climate-just transformation therefore requires us to question our everyday activities and desires, which are expressed through a certain type of consumption. Understanding consumption requires the acceptance of fundamental psychological, social and biophysical parameters that act as a multi-causal cause on consumption behavior (Spash & Dobering, 2017). In addition, the dichotomy of agency vs. structure as the cause of consumption should be overcome (ibid.), for example using concepts such as compensatory consumption from critical theory.

As part of the doctoral project, a social science study of middle-class milieus and their central consumer behavior/decisions, such as the purchase of a single-family home or air travel, will be carried out. This consumer behavior is of relevance, as it is constitutive for the identity of the respective milieus and builds up a life path that shapes the professional career as well as further consumption decisions that further consolidate the imperial lifestyles.

The doctoral project is characterized by its transdisciplinary approach, which seeks a transformation of consumer behaviour on an equal footing with consumers. The research project claims to make the fundamental findings of research usable for socio-ecological transformation. As a result, the doctoral project can be located within a young academic niche of transformative consumer research.

Spash, C. L. & Dobernig, K. (2017). Theories of (un)sustainable consumption. In Routledge Handbook of Ecological Economics: Nature and Society (S. 203). Routledge.

Brand, U. & Wissen, M. (2015). Imperiale Lebensweise: Zur Ausbeutung von Mensch und Natur in Zeiten des globalen Kapitalismus.

Marcel Lemmer: Comparative Analysis of Constitutive Narratives of State (Dis)Loyalty through the Lens of Military Desertion

My research focuses on the constitution and contestation of state and collective narratives, examining their influences on the citizens of various states. Narratives demanding and justifying state loyalty are pervasive: whether it’s paying taxes, showing civil courage, integrating, engaging, or participating in elections – people are always more or less committed to the interests and values of a state.

With my project, I aim to develop a research approach to public reflection on these narratives of state loyalty. Specifically, I seek to draw conclusions about everyday and elusive narratives – and overall civic state loyalty – through the unique performative dimension of military contestation with the narrative of state loyalty (in contexts of life or death). In the first step, I reconstruct societal and military narratives from countries such as Afghanistan, China, Germany, Israel, Ukraine, and the USA, which promote the belonging and loyalty of their citizens and soldiers to varying degrees.

In the second step, I analyze the military reflection of these narratives to understand which ones are perceived as convincing and generate a sense of belonging and loyalty among soldiers – and which ones are less effective. This also addresses the question of whether and how narratives of state loyalty influence soldiers‘ decisions not to desert. Potentially interesting comparison groups could be artists, athletes, and teachers from a state who operate abroad (e.g., through the Goethe-Institut).

Marlene May: Social virtual reality (Social VR) and the effects on the identity of users and the formation of virtual (sub-)communities

Are we more ourselves when we are not ourselves? Is there a facet of ourselves that we only discover when we (must) reinvent ourselves?

Marlene May’s PhD project deals with virtual (community) affiliation and one’s own (digital) self in social virtual spaces (social VR). From a media studies perspective, this monographic PhD uses qualitative methods to analyze and process two community cases and collect data in order to later answer the research question(s) in the context of the theoretical foundations introduced on reality, people, identity, space and community. The social communities selected in the context of this dissertation serve as the two primary case studies of this dissertation, yet the resulting findings are not limited exclusively to these groupings but go beyond the specific group consideration.

In summary, this PhD shows what effects the use of social VR has on the identity of users and the (sub-)communities operating and emerging in virtual spaces, what new forms of community affiliation are emerging in virtual spaces, in order to simultaneously fill the existing research gap in this sub-area and create new potential for follow-up research within various disciplines, including interdisciplinary research.