The research environment Tema Q's main focus and strengths are in the areas of mediated culture, cultural heritage and form, aesthetics and design.
Mediated Culture
Research in mediated culture has a broad focus and includes studies of media texts themselves as well as their production, dissemination, use, and regulation. We examine the mediation and materialities of culture from both contemporary and historical perspectives, while striving towards being interdisciplinary and methodologically innovative.
We have a specific and unique profile in our expertise on intellectual property and various forms of regulatory practices vis-à-vis media technologies and knowledge-circulating principles.
Of special interest is the intersection between different materialities and the formal and informal norms through which knowledge circulates in society. Our current multidisciplinary research on patents and knowledge circulation focuses on the patent's relationship to documents, files and information history and ties in with perspectives from media-archeology and material culture. Here, we are connected to a lively and interdisciplinary international research front that spans across a number of disciplines that have in common the interest in how artistic works as well as knowledge and innovation are regulated, controlled, and owned.
Cultural heritage
What inheritances are kept for the future and how comes that some memories, histories and material remnants are given priority, and some are obscured in practices such as collecting, archiving, exhibiting and performing meaningful pasts? Cultural heritage research at Tema Culture and Society studies the changing meanings and use of both material and intangible cultural heritage within and outside institutions. We contribute on an interdisciplinary basis to the development in research fields such as critical heritage studies, museology and cultural memory studies.
Our research has a special focus on a critical understanding of digital practices and the political, democratic, economic and material effects of digitization and globalization of meaningful pasts.
Another area of strength is our research into the changing societal roles of museums. In this area we contribute with theoretical and methodological reflection on the continuously changing frameworks for the social relevance of museums and archives. Furthermore, our research focuses on relations between intellectual property and cultural heritage, and on studies of traditional knowledge and natural resources in terms of ownership and use of common assets.
The Forum for Form, Aesthetics and Design
The Forum for Form, Aesthetics and Design is a platform intended to initiate, inspire and develop the interaction between interpretative perspectives and undergraduate education, research, and infrastructure at the Department of Culture and Society. The forum unites the aesthetic, interpretive and craft-centred fields of undergraduate education and the interdisciplinary approach on which these fields are based.
The forum stands on a scientific foundation and supports the integration of theoretical and practical perspectives. Internal and external actors are invited to an advanced seminar series associated with form and craft studies, where they present and develop artistic projects and their own texts, discuss current research, and find collaboration in applications for research grants, etc.
