Research

The research in the School of Humanities incorporates several closely-knit research areas and is conducted both within the five Study Areas and under the auspices of two research centres: the Institute of History, Archaeology and Art History, and the Centre for Landscape and Culture.

 

At university level several of our research areas have been gathered under the Tallinn University Centre of Excellence in Intercultural Studies.

 
Our research foci include:
 

• the theoretical analysis of culturally dependable meaning-making processes, complemented and supported by empirical research in the fields of meaning-making in spatial, textual, performative and visual practices;
• historical analysis of actors and networks in the medieval and early modern Baltic sea region;
• the Estonian societal processes during the last five centuries in the context of transnational history;
• analysis of "own" versus "foreign" image making in 20th century Estonian cultures;
• the intercultural/interlinguistic and culture internal (specific)/intersemiotic translation mechanisms;
• the analysis of language usage and acquisition;
• signs of societal changes and cultural phenomena detectable within the landscape, focusing on spatial relationships between people and natural environment and their manifestations both in the physical environment and written and pictorial images.