Call for Applications: Fellowships at CAPAS 2027-2028
CAPAS is a centre for advanced studies at Heidelberg University dedicated to innovative and socially relevant research on the end(s) of world(s). Going beyond traditional disciplinary and institutional boundaries, we bring together outstanding international scholars and scientists to contribute to the centre’s collaborative research while working on their individual projects. It is our mission to make space for a diverse knowledge collective, enriching exchanges in the humanities with insights from relevant perspectives from the social, life, and natural sciences and integrating non-academic forms of knowledge production in the arts and beyond. For further information on CAPAS, please refer to our website.
In the 2027–2028 academic year, we focus on the role of vulnerabilities. This annual topic enables the intersectional differentiation of vulnerability and thus reflects different degrees of exposure of individuals and communities towards existential threats, while it considers the relationship of individuals and communities to apocalyptic fantasies as a result of their positionality. Vulnerability applies to all disciplines because the concept is not limited to physical injuries, the options for protection (e.g. through bunkerisation and prepping) or access to medical help, but also includes topics such as political risk management, the predictability of and adaptation to crises, as well as the impact of epistemic violence and the associated dangers and forms of injustice. From a historical perspective, epistemic violence manifests itself, for example, in the colonial oppression of indigenous epistemologies; today it concerns, for example, the increasing importance of big data and algorithms or “haunted data”. As an aspect of human embeddedness in ecosystems and “more-than-human entanglements”, the topic of vulnerability is also compatible with approaches from life and environmental sciences. In addition, the term also invites reflection on transdisciplinary connections in knowledge production, in the sense of a “vulnerability of science.” Furthermore, there is a growing interest in the political scope of vulnerability as a collective, embodied and mobilising form of resistance, highlighting interdependence, coalition, and shared ethics in a seemingly disintegrating world.
The deadline for applications is 3 July 2026.