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Topic · Literature and Literary Theory

German Literature and Culture Studies

German Literature and Culture Studies is a research topic within Literature and Literary Theory. Science Explorer counts 25k research works in it since 1950. 10.2% of them reached the world's top 10% most cited for their field and year.

This cluster of papers encompasses a wide range of topics in literary studies and criticism, including authorship, bildungsroman, literature critique, gender, aesthetics, cultural memory, poetics, romanticism, and identity.

  • Autorschaft
  • Bildung
  • Literaturkritik
  • Gender
  • Ästhetik
  • Gedächtnis
  • Poetik
  • Kultur
  • Romanticism
  • Identity
Research works
25k
fractional, since 1950
In the world top 10%
2.6k
per year above
Top-10% rate
10.2%
share of its works in the world top 10%
Growth, 2018-21 → 2022-25
-12%
the tick is no change
Largest producer
Germany
67% of the 10 largest, 2022-now
German Literature and Culture Studies

Which countries lead German Literature and Culture Studies research?

By volume, Germany and the United States publish the most (2.9k and 331 works in 2022-now).

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 Germany 2.9k works
  2. 2 United States 331 works
  3. 3 Austria 303 works
  4. 4 Switzerland 264 works
  5. 5 France 148 works
  6. 6 United Kingdom 136 works
  7. 7 Italy 77 works
  8. 8 Poland 68 works
  9. 9 Türkiye 52 works
  10. 10 Russia 52 works

How concentrated that is

The same countries as shares of everything the list above accounts for. A node where two countries do two thirds of the work and one spread evenly across twelve read alike as a ranking and not at all alike here.

Germany: 66.7%United States: 7.7%Austria: 7.1%Switzerland: 6.1%6 others listed: 12.4%67%largest
Germany2,864 · 66.7%United States331 · 7.7%Austria303 · 7.1%Switzerland264 · 6.1%6 others listed534 · 12.4%

Shares of the rows listed above, not of the whole node.

Which institutions lead German Literature and Culture Studies research?

By volume in 2022-now, Freie Universität Berlin publishes the most German Literature and Culture Studies research, followed by Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 Freie Universität BerlinGermany 99 works
  2. 2 Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität MünchenGermany 91 works
  3. 3 Humboldt-Universität zu BerlinGermany 72 works
  4. 4 University of MünsterGermany 64 works
  5. 5 University of CologneGermany 63 works
  6. 6 University of ViennaAustria 58 works
  7. 7 Goethe University FrankfurtGermany 58 works
  8. 8 Universität HamburgGermany 56 works
  9. 9 Heinrich Heine University DüsseldorfGermany 56 works
  10. 10 Ruhr University BochumGermany 54 works

Who are the leading researchers in German Literature and Culture Studies?

The most-cited researchers publishing on German Literature and Culture Studies include Dan J. Stein, Pierre Bourdıeu and Wolfgang K. Huber.

  1. 1 Dan J. Stein South Africa 306k citations
  2. 2 Pierre Bourdıeu France 268k citations
  3. 3 Wolfgang K. Huber Germany 239k citations
  4. 4 Nicholas G. Martin Australia 228k citations
  5. 5 Marko Sarstedt Germany 221k citations
  6. 6 Michel Foucault France 208k citations

Ranked by citations received across their whole record, among researchers with at least three works on this topic.

What are the most cited papers in German Literature and Culture Studies?

The most cited paper in German Literature and Culture Studies is "The Origin of German Tragic Drama" (Don Callen, Walter W Benjamin, 1978), with 1,109 citations. Next come "WAHRHEIT UND METHODE" (1,027) and "Kritik der Urteilskraft (1790)" (302).

Most cited papers
#PaperReleasedCitations
1 The Origin of German Tragic Drama Don Callen, Walter W Benjamin · Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 1978 1,109
2 WAHRHEIT UND METHODE Hans‐Georg Gadamer · Bijdragen 1973 1,027
3 Kritik der Urteilskraft (1790) Gerd Irrlitz · J.B. Metzler eBooks Book chapter 2015 302
4 Kreis und Kugel Wilhelm Blaschke · Teubner-Archiv zur Mathematik Book chapter 1987 287
5 PROTESTANTISM AND LITERACY IN EARLY MODERN GERMANY Richard L. Gawthrop, Gerald Strauss · Past & Present 1984 267
All 98 most cited papers, with filters and sorting

Where is German Literature and Culture Studies research done?

The largest centres of German Literature and Culture Studies research in 2022-now are Berlin (Germany), Vienna (Austria), Munich (Germany) and Cologne (Germany). Among places with at least 20 works in it, it is an unusually large share of all research in Sulzbach-Rosenberg, Wuppertal and Bamberg.

Largest cities, 2022-now

  1. 1 BerlinGermany 296 works
  2. 2 ViennaAustria 158 works
  3. 3 MunichGermany 158 works
  4. 4 CologneGermany 116 works
  5. 5 HamburgGermany 107 works
  6. 6 Frankfurt am MainGermany 92 works
  7. 7 ZurichSwitzerland 90 works
  8. 8 DüsseldorfGermany 78 works
  9. 9 MünsterGermany 78 works
  10. 10 MainzGermany 70 works

Where it is the local speciality

  1. Sulzbach-RosenbergDE · 41.6 works774×
  2. WuppertalDE · 46.3 works61×
  3. BambergDE · 25.8 works53×
← less than its size predicts1×more →

Location quotient: how much more of its research is in German Literature and Culture Studies than the world average.

See German Literature and Culture Studies on the map

Where is the best place to study German Literature and Culture Studies?

Among universities, judged by research, Freie Universität Berlin, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and University of Göttingen score highest, combining citation excellence, specialisation, size, growth and international reach. Research strength is one signal when choosing where to study; it does not measure teaching.

0%10%20%mean 11.02%fractional works in this field (log) →share of work in the world top 10% →Goethe University Fr…Johannes Gutenberg U…University of Göttin…Freie Universität Be…
above the meannear itbelow it

One dot per university in the first ten of the table below, at the default weights. The upper left is the interesting corner: small places doing unusually strong work.

Citation excellenceshare of its work in the world top 10%, 2022-now and all time averaged
40%
Specialisationhow much of its work is in this field, counted up to 10× the world share
10%
Sizeits output in this field, on a log scale
30%
Growthoutput growth, counted from -20% to +20%
10%
Internationalshare of its work with a co-author abroad
10%
Each slider sets a weight; the share it gets of the score is beside it.
#UniversityScoreTop 10%SpecialisationWorksGrowth
1Freie Universität BerlinGermany 77.58.3%57.7×99 +16.8%
2Johannes Gutenberg University MainzGermany 75.412.2%32.5×50 +55.0%
3University of GöttingenGermany 75.110.7%32.9×49 +60.3%
4Goethe University FrankfurtGermany 74.820.1%31.3×58 -19.5%
5University of MünsterGermany 74.610.9%35.9×64 +71.3%
6Humboldt-Universität zu BerlinGermany 73.28.6%48.0×72 +28.3%
7University of ViennaAustria 72.89.6%27.9×58 +11.1%
8Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität MünchenGermany 72.212.9%25.4×91 -14.4%
9University of BaselSwitzerland 69.010.0%22.0×34 +116.7%
10University of BernSwitzerland 68.16.9%17.9×41 +92.8%

Universities only. The score blends citation excellence (40%), size (30%), specialisation (10%), growth (10%), international reach (10%), 2022-now; growth compares 2018-21 with 2022-25 and counts up to +20%, since a jump from a small base is mostly noise.

Every institution in German Literature and Culture Studies, country by country

Is German Literature and Culture Studies research growing?

Output in 2022-2025 was 12% lower than in 2018-2021, peaking in 2022.

still counting19801990200020102020
grewheldshrank

The same series as a ribbon: one cell per year, darker for more. The line above answers how much; this answers when.

Its share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share: all of science grows. This is German Literature and Culture Studies as a percentage of every work published that year, 0.014% in 2024.

still counting0.020%0.040%0.060%German Literature and Culture Studies0.012% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works of German Literature and Culture Studies over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

Year by year.

still counting5%10%15%German Literature and Culture Studies9.5% in 2025200020102020

Of each year's works in it, the share that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. A field is the world for its own topics, so there is no other line to hold it against.

Which topics inside it are moving

Growth and decline on one axis around a shared zero. Two lists side by side hide the thing that matters: whether the growth dwarfs the decline, or the other way round.

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