All episodes

In this episode, Sabine Schäfer from the BGHS talks to Simon Groß, doctoral researcher at the BGHS and currently working as an integration helper in a school for children with special needs, about his PhD conditions. Simon gives insights into how he got the job, his daily routines of reconciling academic work and employment, and the joys of academic thinking.

This episode is a guest episode of "Chances and Challenges - The BGHS podcast" hosted by four BGHS doctoral researchers: Iris Bartelt, Jakob Krusche, Josué García Veiga, and Christina Zschieschang. We discuss how we experience daily life as scholars in the humanities and the social sciences, how we find routines and structures with alternating tasks and under uncertain circumstances and how we experience collaboration and networking as PhD scholars.

In this episode, Sabine Schäfer from the BGHS talks to Clara Buitrago, a BGHS alumna and coordinator for internationalisation at the BGHS, about how Clara coped with a chronic illness during her PhD and her professional career at university and what it has meant for her life today.

In this episode, Sabine Schäfer from the BGHS talks to Sophie Borchelt, doctoral researcher at the BGHS and coordinator for internationalisation at the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University, about what it feels like to reconcile children, employment at university, and working on the PhD. They are addressing the challenges of this situation, but they focus especially on the rewards and on how we, as members of society, can help make the situation easier.

In this episode, Sabine Schäfer from the BGHS talks to Thomas Faist, professor of sociology of transnationalisation, migration, and development at Bielefeld University, about transitions and developments of doctoral researchers during the PhD phase. They are dealing with issues such as the transition from student to researcher, the impact of different funding conditions of doctoral researchers on this development, and possible role conflicts.

In this episode, Martina Kessel, professor of modern history and gender history, shares her view on PhD supervision, internationalisation, and gender history. In her talk with Sabine Schäfer, executive manager of the BGHS, she gives insights into what has changed during the last decades and what she is expecting and also hoping for the future.

This episode offers insights into what it's like to quit the PhD. Mariza Mathis, a former member of the BGHS, talks to Sabine Schäfer, executive manager of the BGHS, about the process she went through when she had doubts about continuing her PhD and how she finally decided to quit and take on a job in science management.

This episode sheds light on why it makes sense for PhD researchers at German universities to engage in academic self-government. First, it ensures that all members of the university bring their perspectives to the institution's decision-making processes. And second, it helps to get acquainted with the institutions’ structures and people, which might boost the academic career. Sabine Schäfer, executive manager of the BGHS, talks about this often underestimated topic with Oliver Flügel-Martinsen, professor of political theory and dean of the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University.

Todays Episode will be about one of the leading principles of the bghs: Internationalization. Around 36% of our doctoral researchers are internationals, which shows that that topic is extremely important to us. We offer a programme that can be entirely completed in English without knowing german, all of the information we give out comes in a german AND English version and we have a Coordinator for Internationalization, Clara Buitrago. But there is only so much we can do alone. The entire “eco-system” of the university plays a huge role for caring for and supporting international doctoral researchers, so institutions like...

In this episode, we will get another perspective from a professor und the dissertation phase – this time from Professor Ruth Ayaß, she is Professor of Qualitative methods of empirical social research at the faculty of Sociology here at Bielefeld University and of course, she is the director of the BGHS.