Publication formats in cultural studies

In the summer semester 2018, a working group dealt with handbooks, encyclopedias, ABCs and glossaries, i.e. publication formats that are currently extremely successful in the cultural studies and humanities. They are expected to collect, bundle or even synthesize certain fields and findings of research and at the same time make them teachable and learnable.
In the group, new publications in particular were sighted and critically analysed: Where are their strength and fascination, where are their limits and weaknesses? Are certain knowledge contents particularly suitable for reference works, or does this scientific genre ultimately understand itself independently of subject matter? Is the manual form of the respective topic even justified - and if so, how? How differentiated are the individual entries, and to what extent are they communicated with the whole? How usable, how didactic, how useful are the books? And to what extent do they really document the current status – or even set new standards - in the respective field of research?