Studying Cultural Studies

When you study Cultural Studies at Leuphana University, you are aiming for more than just a Bachelor's degree. Your goal is to understand different ways of thinking, to adopt new perspectives and to continuously question your own point of view. The Leuphana Bachelor with a major in Cultural Studies allows you to incorporate diverse interests and encourages you to actively shape your studies.

In the Leuphana semester, you will take a fundamental look at science and scientific methodology. You will sharpen your critical thinking skills in order to question familiar assumptions. You will learn the appropriate approach for gaining systematic knowledge and practise the responsible handling of scientific findings. At the same time, you will receive an introduction to Cultural Studies, whereby you will familiarise yourself with the subject areas and the theoretical and methodological foundations of this subject area at Leuphana University of Lüneburg.

The examination of the principles of academic thinking and working in general as well as the specific introduction to the chosen major form the foundation for the interdisciplinary Bachelor's programme in Cultural Studies.

The minor serves to deepen the major in Cultural Studies or to expand it to include another subject area. You have a free choice here.

The complementary programme offers you the opportunity to pursue your thirst for knowledge individually by immersing yourself in a completely different field of knowledge, such as business psychology, gender relations and spatial structures, Islamic law or design thinking (possibly replace with other, more suitable examples). By leaving your own specialism and exploring different aspects of other disciplines, you will gain an understanding of the diversity of academic cultures as well as inter- and transdisciplinary skills.

In the Cultural Studies: Organization, Society, and the Arts program, we actively train you in a wide array of skills. Through this program, you gain the ability to analyze cultural studies, empowering you to explore the intricate relationship between culture, art, and society in a theoretically robust and empirically supported manner. Reflecting on these analyses cultivates practical and imaginative knowledge, especially within the realms of cultural organization, management, entrepreneurship, and alternative methods of cultural production.

This program equips you with empirical research skills to transform theoretical insights into independent empirical projects and studies, supported by a robust methodological toolkit. It immerses you in in-depth specialist knowledge encompassing cultural sociology, social theory, art theory, organizational sociology, and cultural business studies within its interdisciplinary framework at Leuphana University.

By providing internationally compatible instruction in English, the program widens your access to the global art world, the cultural sector, and international academic research and debates. It also offers coursework designed to enhance your academic and professional reading and writing skills in English.

For personal growth, the program offers interdisciplinary skill training, including fostering reflective competence, honing project management abilities, conducting empirical research, fostering interdisciplinary and international cooperation, and building teamwork skills.

This diverse array of skills opens up numerous career pathways and serves as a solid foundation for further study and research opportunities. Consequently, the Cultural Studies: Organization, Society, and the Arts degree program not only enriches you professionally but also thoroughly prepares you for the complexities of modern cultural practice and research.

The following overview lists the modules that you take in the Leuphana Semester (30 credit points, CP), Major Cultural Studies (90 CP), Minor (30 CP) and Complementary Studies (30 CP):

Leuphana Semester

•  Science transformed: responsible action. (interdisciplinary)
•  Science problematises: critical thinking. (interdisciplinary)
•  Science produces: methodological knowledge. (interdisciplinary)
•  Cultural Studies: Organisation, Society, and the Arts - An Introduction
•  Producing knowledge: Academic Reading and Writing in Cultural Studies

2 semester

•  Understanding Cultural Organisation
•  Understanding Culture and Society
•  Understanding the Arts
•  Research Methods for Organisation, Society, and the Arts
•  1 minor module
•  1 complementary module

3 semester

•  Culture, Economy and Society
•  Subjectivity and Power
•  Arts and Institutions
•  Contemporary Challenges in Organisation, Society, and the Arts I: Technology and Ecology
•  1 minor module
•  1 complementary module

4 semester

•  Cultural Organisation in Practice
•  Critique and Protest
•  The Arts in Society
•  2 minor modules
•  1 complementary module

5 semester

•  Projects in Organisation, Society, and the Arts
•  Research Colloquium
•  2 minor modules
•  1 complementary module

6 semester

•  Bachelor Thesis
•  Contemporary Challenges in Organisation, Society, and the Arts II: Migration and Cities
•  2 complementary modules