Angelika Epple & Walter Erhart 
Practices of Comparing 
Towards a New Understanding of a Fundamental Human Practice

Practices of comparing shape how we perceive, organize, and change the world. Supposedly innocent, practices of comparing play a decisive role in forming categories, boundaries, and hierarchies; but they can also give an impetus to question and change such structures. Like almost no other human practice, comparing pervades all social, political, economic, and cultural spheres. This volume outlines the program of a new research agenda that places comparative practices at the center of an interdisciplinary exploration. Its contributions combine case studies with overarching systematic considerations. They show what insights can be gained and which further questions arise when one makes a seemingly trivial practice – comparing – the subject of in-depth research.

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Walter Erhart is professor for German literature and literary studies at Universität Bielefeld. He received his habilitation from Georg-August-Universität Göttingen and his doctorate from Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen. His research areas are German literature from the 18th to the 21st century, literary theory, history of the humanities, travel literature, masculinity and gender studies.
Johannes Grave, born 1976, is professor of art history at Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena and principal investigator at the collaborative research centre »Practices of Comparing«. For his research on art around 1800, early renaissance painting and picture theory he has been awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz-Preis 2020. He is a member of the scientific advisory board of Bielefeld University Press.