Based on philological and cultural historical expertise, research in this context funnels the faculty’s literary studies scholarship in order to examine questions concerning the history of knowledge and ideas, as well as to engage in comparative perspectives. Two key aspects will form the main focus: on the one hand, scholars will investigate the relations between literature and knowledge (for instance regarding the natural sciences, knowledge of the future, medical discourses, or religion); on the other hand, research in this field will also deal with cultures of mediation (i.e. explicit and tacit knowledge, school education, editions, electronical media, etc.). Several questions guide both key aspects: questions regarding the transfer between literatures and cultures of differing languages, different cultural milieus and discourses; and, also, questions concerning contexts within the history of ideas, educational institutions and university disciplines, as well as competing or mutually inspiring forms of art. A particular emphasis is placed on the materiality of literature and its media.