Center Objectives
The Jena Center for Romanticism Research aims to create a stimulating venue for scholarly exchange, where interdisciplinary dialogue and research networks emerge and extend well beyond academia, into society.
The Center is established with close ties to the further institutional and structural development of Romanticism research at Jena. Its mission is not only to initiate new collaborative research projects, but also to expand our networks with museums and other cultural institutions and mobilize these collaborations for the purposes of research, higher education, and to promote the transfer of knowledge between various parts of society.
The Location: Jena
At the end of the 18th century, a philosophical-literary movement took shape in Jena that had a seminal influence on modernity. Early Romanticism and its accompanying phenomena generated impulses for the arts as well as for modern modes of life and knowledge acquisition, and quickly spread across Europe and beyond. In Romantic literature, philosophy, theology, art theory and practice, and even in the natural sciences that were influenced by Romanticism, questions were raised and refined that lastingly shaped modern aesthetics, scholarly debates, and processes of political epistemology. Due to its location and history, Friedrich Schiller University Jena constitutes a singular site where interdisciplinary research on historical Romanticism and its wider contexts is combined with the active exploration of Romanticism’s ongoing, present-day relevance.
Our current historical moment mandates the reflection on and charting of the foundations of modern societies. It is crucial to structurally compare the social formations of the 18th and early 19th centuries with those of the early 21st century. This approach continues the underlying objective of the Laboratorium Aufklärung [Enlightenment Laboratory], a research center operating at Friedrich Schiller University Jena from 2008 to 2022. The Jena Center for Romanticism Research furthermore picks up the work of the “Research Center for European Romanticism” and the DFG-funded Graduiertenkolleg [graduate research training school] “Modell Romantik” (2015–2024) and thus continues to link the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, the Faculty of Theology, and the Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences.
The Program
In addition to scholars, the Center’s program integrates cultural partner institutions and the interested (urban) public through formats such as author readings, exhibitions, and public discussions. Especially this bringing together of diverse actors and interests will generate crucial new perspectives.
The Center’s program is initially structured along three tenets that examining Romanticism in different constellations and fields of tension. These consist of …
- theories and methods of Romanticism research in relation to various disciplinary approaches and traditions as well as transdisciplinary analytical processes,
- the diversity of European ‘Romanticisms’ and their potentially Eurocentric relationship to non-European cultures, and
- the historicity of the ‘Romantic’ and ‘Romanticism,’ their transformation, and their impact up to the present day.
The Jena Center for Romanticism Research considers itself as a catalyst and facilitator of research conducted by scholars located in Jena.
The Research Center foster international scholarly cooperation and brings together local and global expertise and perspectives.
It aims to actively support early-career researchers and thereby strengthen scholarly excellence in the field.
The Center also enhances the transfer of knowledge and fosters collaboration between the university and non-university institutions.