Centre for Digital Cultures

Organisational unit: Institute

Organisation profile

Contemporary culture is characterized by the ubiquity of digital media technologies and infrastructures, which are constantly configuring our techniques for processing, storing, and transmitting data. As a result, our everyday practices of connecting, relating, reading, writing, perceiving, sharing, competing, and communicating are undergoing significant changes. At the same time, these technologies are closely tied to major societal challenges such as climate change, global conflicts, digital divides and social unjustness. In this dynamic context, the Centre for Digital Cultures (CDC) directly addresses the emergence of new and complex qualities of vernacular socio-technical life. This involves the development of advanced theory and innovative study programmes. We are concerned with the question of how we can understand and shape digital cultures today​​​​​​​.

Main research areas

The digital shift re-shapes the cultural sectors, and, indeed, everyday life, politics, law, and economics. the Centre for Digital Cultures (CDC), affiliated to Leuphana University of Lüneburg, examines this shift through a range of interdisciplinary methodologies, including media, cultural and social studies, through knowledge creation and transfer, as well as by developing experimental and interventionist media practices. Established in 2012, as one of the first research centres in Europe to research the emergence of digital cultures, the CDC continues to produce cutting-edge research on socio-technical regimes of inclusion and exclusion. Since its inception, the CDC has built an innovative network and research environment, where academic institutions, practitioners, and civil society stakeholders engage with new concepts, formats, and applications within digital cultures.

Current Research Areas

  • Climate Futures
  • (B)Orders, Identities and Belonging in the Digital Age
  • Cities, Infrastructures, Logistics, Platforms 
  1. Published

    Babylonian Dreams: From Info-Cities to Smart Cities to Experimental Collectivism

    Apprich, C., 31.07.2017, In: The Fibreculture Journal. 29, p. 10-30 21 p.

    Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

  2. Published

    Introduction to General Ecology: The Ecologization of Thinking

    Hörl, E. H. & Schott, N. F. (Translator), 05.2017, General Ecology: The New Ecological Paradigm. Hörl, E. & Burton, J. (eds.). London: Bloomsbury Academic, p. 1 – 75 75 p. (Theory).

    Research output: Contributions to collected editions/worksContributions to collected editions/anthologiesResearchpeer-review

  3. Published

    Entladene Massen: Zur Krise eines Begriffs

    Hagen, W., 2014, Soziale Medien - Neue Massen: Medienwissenschaftliche Symposien der DFG. Pias, C., Baxmann, I. & Beyes, T. (eds.). Zürich / Berlin: Diaphanes Verlag, p. 125-134 10 p.

    Research output: Contributions to collected editions/worksContributions to collected editions/anthologiesResearchpeer-review

  4. Published

    Online to offline social networking: contextualising sociality today through Couchsurfing.org

    Bialski, P., 2013, Couchsurfing cosmopolitanisms: Can tourism make a better world?. Picard, D. & Buchberger, S. (eds.). Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, p. 161-172 11 p.

    Research output: Contributions to collected editions/worksContributions to collected editions/anthologiesResearchpeer-review

  5. Published

    Train Ticket Sharing: Alternative Forms of Computing in the City

    Bialski, P., 31.07.2017, In: The Fibreculture Journal. 29, p. 115-128 14 p.

    Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

  6. Published

    Denk mal! 2016

    Pfaller, R., Horn, E., Klein, S., Bernard, A. & Rammler, S., 2015, Frankfurt am Mainz: S. Fischer Verlag. 268 p.

    Research output: Books and anthologiesCollected editions and anthologiesTransfer

  7. Published

    Das Wissen des Profils: Über das Selbstdesign in der digitalen Kultur

    Bernard, A., 2017, Profile: Interdisziplinäre Beiträge. Degeling, M., Othmer, J., Weich, A. & Westermann, B. (eds.). Lüneburg: meson press, p. 27-36 10 p.

    Research output: Contributions to collected editions/worksContributions to collected editions/anthologiesResearchpeer-review

  8. Published

    Lifted: A Cultural History of the Elevator

    Bernard, A., 01.01.2014, New York: NYU Press. 309 p.

    Research output: Books and anthologiesBook

  9. Published

    Home for Hire: How the sharing economy commoditises our private sphere

    Bialski, P., 01.01.2017, Sharing Economies in Times of Crisis: Practices, Politics and Possibilities. Ince, A. & Hall, S. M. (eds.). Oxford: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, p. 83-95 13 p. (Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy).

    Research output: Contributions to collected editions/worksChapterpeer-review

  10. Published

    Organisation im soziotechnischen Gemenge: Mediale Umschichtungen durch die Einführung von SAP

    Conrad, L., 01.02.2017, Bielefeld: transcript Verlag. 210 p.

    Research output: Books and anthologiesMonographsResearchpeer-review