The aim of the research cluster is to promote interdisciplinary research into children’s and young adult literature. The centre of research interests is on children’s and young adult literature as an aesthetic-literary, media-related, social, psychological, historical and educational phenomenon. As a subject of research, children’s and young adult literature thus serves as a unifying link between various academic disciplines:

On the one hand, current and future developments from a media studies perspective offer approaches to research questions that focus, for example, on the inter- and transmedia nature of children’s and young adult literature. On the other hand, the historical perspective is significant, meaning that questions concerning, for example, different conceptions of childhood at various times, their respective historical contexts and specific representations also occupy a central place within this research cluster. Furthermore, questions arise from a didactic perspective, which deal, for example, with the pedagogical and aesthetic demands placed on children’s and young adult literature or, more specifically, teaching concepts grounded in subject-specific didactics for various media of children’s and young adult literature, ranging from picture books to all-age literature. The topic of the general significance of children’s and young adult literature for (interdisciplinary) school teaching – for example, in subjects such as German, philosophy, values and norms, history or General Studies – can also provide a basis for relevant research questions. Similarly, an art-historical perspective on children’s and young adult literature – with regard to illustrations and broader questions of aesthetic design – constitutes an important area of work for the research cluster.

Internal interdisciplinary research activities within the university in this field are more closely networked and coordinated through the Oldenburg Research Centre for Children’s and Young Adult Literature (OlFoKi), which was founded in 1997. Furthermore, the research centre maintains links with other research centres specialising in children’s and young adult literature in the German-speaking world. OlFoKi works closely with the libraries in Oldenburg, in particular with the archive and library of the Library and Information System at the University of Oldenburg, and supports the expansion of the already very extensive collection of children’s and young adult literature. Another key task of OlFoKi is to provide academic support for the Oldenburg Children’s and Young Adult Book Fair (KIBUM), which takes place every November, through conferences, exhibitions and publications, thereby communicating research questions and findings to a wider public.

OlFoKi website https://uol.de/olfoki

KIBUM website https://www.kibum.de

The research cluster serves to network and raise the profile of research activities in the field of children’s and young adult literature beyond the scope of OlFoKi, and invites interested parties from all academic disciplines – including advanced students who are, for example, exploring children’s and young adult literature as part of a dissertation – to get involved in building and expanding the research cluster.

The contact persons are as follows: