Profile of the subject area in research and teaching

The sociology of diversity examines the significance of difference in the coexistence of people, social, institutional and organizational as well as individual construction processes of dominance and subordination (marginality and hegemony), their respective effects and their potential for empowerment and action. A special focus is placed on the intertwined axes of difference that regulate socio-societal and interactive relationships: Affiliations and allocations to genders, age groups, indigenous or migrant groups, sexualities, milieus and social classes, groups with different mental and/or physical abilities. Catching up with the complexity of these relationships and the interweaving of the various differences (keyword: intersectionality) theoretically, methodologically and methodically is an exciting challenge that the sociology of diversity faces by drawing on gender studies, postcolonial and cultural studies, (dis)ability studies and sexuality studies as well as other (interdisciplinary) approaches.

Central to the diversity-conscious perspective is a critical view of domination that can appropriately analyze social inequality, for example in relation to the social and private division of labor, in relation to the global and local distribution of resources or in relation to the possibilities of participation and the risk of exclusion. Last but not least, it deals with questions of social justice and conditions of social participation and social recognition.