The aim of study projects in the Geography curriculum is to learn researching. This winter semester, cultural geography students engage in a qualitative research project with direct applicability for urban planning in Hanover.
The “Office for Participation Culture and Urban Development” [Büro für Beteiligungskultur und Stadtentwicklung e.V.; bbs] has started an initiative to lower thresholds for public participation in urban development. The bbs team has noticed that professional stakeholders in urban development often use terms and concepts, which are not fully or equally understood and interpreted by all potential participants, Hanover’s inhabitants. As a consequence, many inhabitants do not recognize their stakes and opportunities to engage in urban development, sometimes specific terms and concepts even lead to an outright rejection of development projects. Therefore, the bbs is interested in understanding how urban developers can adapt and improve their language to target their diverse audiences more adequately - that is, different social groups in Hannover’s society, who are all entitled to participate. With a more language- and concept-sensitive participation culture, urban developers can better convey their ideas, improve the inhabitants’ understanding of how they are concerned, and thus, their motivation to participate in urban development.
