Course content and focus areas
Are you interested in the role of science and technology in everyday life? Would you like to explore why knowledge and expertise are often contested? Are you looking for a master's program that places your research interests at the center?
If so, our research-oriented master's program "Science and Technology Studies" (STS), taught in English, might be the perfect choice for you. STS is an interdisciplinary approach that examines the mutual shaping of science, technology, and society, focusing on the relationships between specialist knowledge, technological development, economy, governance, and contemporary cultures. Our STS program is part of the Social Studies of Science, Technology, and Society and is enriched through collaboration with cultural anthropology, sociology, and human geography. What makes our STS program unique is the consistent ethnographic perspective that characterizes the research conducted by both students and faculty. The program is offered by the Institute for Cultural Anthropology and European Ethnology at Goethe University.
Throughout your studies, you will learn to understand science and technology as social and material practices. In our two-year research curriculum, you will carry out an 18-month ethnographic project based on your own research interests. In the first academic year, you will acquire the necessary knowledge and skills to turn your research idea into an STS project.
Alongside the cohort-based research curriculum — where you’ll develop and conduct your own ethnographic project — you’ll have the freedom to shape your studies by choosing seminars throughout the full two-year program. These are organized within two thematic modules, covering a wide spectrum: from the social studies of finance, markets, and economic modeling to debates on sustainability governance, biomedical controversies, or the politics of technology (think algorithmic bias, techno-fascism, or activist research). Core STS frameworks — like feminist technoscience, material semiotics, or infrastructure studies — are woven into these courses, ensuring that your learning is both conceptually rigorous and grounded in real-world case studies.
Read more here.
Qualifications offered
Our research-oriented master’s program grounds you in ethnographic methods at the forefront of STS – tools designed to analyze how science, technology, and society co-produce meaning, power, and material realities. Through your 18 -moth-long fieldwork project, you will:
- Master empirical research techniques (participant observation, expert interviews, multi-sited ethnography) to investigate real-world controversies, from algorithmic governance to clinical trials.
- Develop critical frameworks to interrogate the political, epistemological, and ethical dimensions of knowledge production – essential for navigating the complexities of a globalized, technologized world.
What makes Frankfurt STS distinct? What sets Frankfurt STS apart is its focus on the everyday work that sustains institutions. Ethnography here is not merely used to study professional settings but reveals the hidden work that holds them together. Whether in labs, offices, or tech startups; our graduates learn to spot frictions where grand policies meet local realities. Students learn to identify those moments—silent labor behind scientific claims, the bargaining that shapes policy tools—and to explain them clearly to different audiences. As translators between engineers and communities, bureaucrats and activists, our graduates learn to describe how knowledge is made while helping reshape these processes. Thereby, they can create greater accountability in fields like user research, international NGOs, science communication and data infrastructures.
Careers & Further Study: STS graduates enter diverse professions, from technology assessment to urban planning, where their expertise in analyzing knowledge systems is increasingly valued. For a detailed overview of career paths and PhD opportunities, explore Perspectives.
Program Structure
In the first year, the foundational module "Theoretical Intersections" introduces students from all academic backgrounds to the concept of STS and its contemporary debates. The research curriculum is a series of four modules spanning the duration of the MA program. It offers a unique program of coursework, independent research, and supervision, enabling students to develop their research problem into an in-depth ethnographic study. This curriculum is taught alongside Theoretical Intersections and thematic modules, guiding students through the research-oriented learning process toward the master's thesis. Expect to spend more than half of your weekly workload (average of 40 hours) on your research project. Learn more about the Research Curriculum here.