Theater in competition. Diversity as a criterion for cultural funding (D06*)

• Subject Area: Theatre and Media Studies
• Term: since 2026
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 442261292

The project examines practices of human differentiation in current cultural funding and the associated application process in the context of theater. It sheds light on how the selection of theater makers deemed worthy of funding is based on distinctions according to human categories in the course of political diversification efforts. The extent to which theater projects reference current social processes of human differentiation in their funding applications is also explored. A European cooperation project and German theater competitions will serve as examples to shed light on the interactions of stratifying and categorizing differentiation practices in the field of cultural funding.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres
• Subproject of: SFB 1482: Studies in Human Differentiation
• Applicant Institution: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz
• Project Head: Dr. Stefanie Husel