Methods of Education and Social Research with Specific Consideration of Gender Studies / Sociology

Department of Educational and Social Sciences

The courses are mainly based on three thematic strands:

firstly, the analysis of sociology as historically situated discipline of knowledge (production), which is closely entangled with andro- and anthropocentric, colonial modernity and therefore subjected to current questioning of its categories and fundamental assumptions. Current theoretical developments from gender, queer, postcolonial and subaltern studies are important references. In this teaching strand, epistemological and ethical questions of precarized lives and more than human actors are paramount. Regarding theory, approaches of feminist New Materialism and feminist Black Studies play a major role.

Secondly, the courses address symbolic gender orders, institutionalized gender relations  and gendered modes of subjectivation, self-relations and practices on the basis  of various fields and entanglements, such as education and social inequalities, divergent lifestyles, marginalizations and privileged status in the post-migrant society, precarization of (gainful) work and care relations.

The third focus relates to the testing of actor-oriented and relational qualitative methods of social  research (e.g. biographical and problem-oriented interviews, participatory observation / ethnography, group discussions) within the framework of newly developed research-practically oriented study modules. Participative survey and evaluation methods (e.g. research workshops) shall be taken into account and tested. Human centered science procedures shall be critically cosidered with regard to their limitations and attempts that challenge there procedures shall be undertaken.

You can also find an up-to-date overview of the courses Prof.*in Dr.*in Susanne Völker teaches via Klips: https://klips2.uni-koeln.de/co/wblvangebot.wbshowlvoffer?ppersonnr=59948
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