The Department of Global Studies provides a distinct approach to understanding our contemporary world by combining language-based area studies of Brazil, China, Japan, India, and Russia with European and International Studies and a global perspective. As an academic field, Global Studies was born only in the late 1990s and its exponential growth and importance soared in the 2000s. Its main elements all find their root cause in the insight that contemporary global conditions cannot be studied in ways reserved for states and their interaction only. Taking a holistic approach, Global Studies takes history, cultural studies and anthropology just as seriously as political science, sociology and economics.
In step with this approach, we do not understand nations and regions as cultural containers, but as globally connected. Likewise, disciplines are not understood as knowledge containers, but as connected ways of addressing similar questions.
Students at the Department of Global Studies grow to become critical and self-confident citizens of the contemporary global world. Graduates from Global Studies are well prepared to work in research, in teaching, for public institutions and ministries as well as within the private sector, where global competencies, even in small and medium-sized enterprises, are demanded increasingly.
The goal of Brazilian Studies within Global Studies at AU is to apply knowledge about Brazil and the Portuguese language to real world problems and international issues. Beyond obtaining proficiency in the 5th most spoken language in the world, Brazilian Studies prepares students to think critically and articulate persuasively on a range of subjects, including migration, urbanization, economics, government and environment that include Brazil but are not limited to it. The program provides students with important conceptual tools from the social sciences and cultural studies and is applied, and project-centered.
We study and teach on China within the academic tradition of language-based area studies. Our main concern is with Chinese society, culture and history in contemporary and twentieth century Chinese society with a particular research focus on Chinese socialization, migration, cultural production and language acquisition. A comprehensive study program - BA, MA, PhD - in China Studies with numerous possibilities of specializations and study opportunities in China is offered. The China Studies section closely cooperates in interdisciplinary research and teaching with the different sections of the Department of Global Studies. We are also engaged in many outreach activities such as further education and giving media interviews.
Want to know more? Do not hesitate to look up our individual profiles or contact us!
Russian studies offers extensive language, cultural and social training in an important area of Eurasia stretching from Central Europe and the Balkans to Russia’s Far East and the Pacific Ocean. More than 350 million people live here, with the majority using a Slavic language either as a first or second language. Russia’s vast natural resources and increasingly confident foreign policy both engage with and challenge the Eastern European countries. In recent years, the area between the EU and Russia has been caught between identities as the EU’s ‘eastern neighbourhood’ and Russia’s own geopolitical vision.
Our internationally outstanding researchers are experts on Central Europe, the Balkans and Russia. These researchers along with experienced language teachers will guide you as a student; you can learn Russian or Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian (BCS) and spend a semester abroad at a partner university in Russia or the former Yugoslavia. You will study the region as a disciplinary whole: gaining expertise in culture, society, politics and history and acquiring important skills contributing towards future employability.
2019.12.09 | Globale Studier
Andreas Steen has received conference funding from the Carlsberg Foundation for the conference: China Sounds Abroad: Migration, Motivation and Modernity
2019.12.09 | Globale Studier
Hagen Schulz-Forberg receives a Carlsberg Foundation Monograph Fellowship for the project: Upon this Rock. Neoliberalism, Global Governance and Liberal Democracy, 1930-1960.
