Institute of Humanities (IH)

Affiliated Research areas

• Texts and Concepts
• The Study of the Human Past
• Studies of Cultures and Arts

Scientific Areas

• The Study of the Human Past
• Texts and Concepts
• Studies of Cultures and Arts

Keywords

• Research
• cultural studies
• game studies
• software studies
• media practices
• infrastructure
• inequalities
• video games
• innovation
• AI narratives
• AI ethics
• digital humanities
• digital heritage
• preservation
• game engines
• data activism

Summary

The Institute of Humanities coordinates and evaluates research projects conducted by our academics specializing in different sub-disciplines of literary and culture and religion studies. Employees of the Institute include researchers from the Faculty of Humanities in Warsaw, the Faculty of Social Sciences in Warsaw, and the Faculty of Psychology and Communication in Wrocław.

The Institute is responsible for overseeing the research budget, securing research funding from grants and international projects, and research cooperation with research centers abroad, specializing in humanities.

Our team of experts includes cultural anthropologists, media and film experts, literature scholars, anthropologists, linguists, philologists, and translators. This diversity allows us to conduct interdisciplinary projects, conducive to different scientific approaches.

We focus on research, which has a potential to improve the quality of life for various social groups, and conduct studies commissioned by local governments and different organizations.

For example, our researchers, in cooperation with sociologists and psychologists, prepared a comprehensive diagnostic report, which provided data for the development of a multifaceted development strategy for Sopot, a city in northern Poland, for the period 2021-2030. The project was commissioned by the Municipality of Sopot. Furthermore, a team of researchers from the Creative Economy Research Center conducted a comprehensive survey of the artistic community in Poland, which was commissioned by the Fryderyk Chopin Institute. Data obtained in the study provided information on the number of artists, artistic disciplines, and financial standing of artists, which will be used to draft a government regulation on financial support for artists.

Additionally, the Institute secures research grants from various funding bodies, such as the National Science Centre, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, and the Foundation for Polish Science.

Areas of the centre's current and planned projects:

- work on new methodologies and data collection methods, combining traditional ethnography with digital tools;
- activities in the area of digital heritage, linked to cooperation with the COST network Grassroots of Digital Europe;
- research on web platforms and data activism;
- research on narratives of artificial intelligence;
- research on building interdisciplinary groups working on digital technology development;
- research on system design and automation in digital games;
- research on game engines and rule systems.

Our publications focus on various aspects of humanities, such as: literature, art, film, contemporary culture, culture management, creative industry, evolution of social norms, pop culture, the internet, new media, computer games, and other phenomena of audio-visual culture.