What many consider #1 - 2026

The Collaborative Research Centre “Transformations of the Popular” at the University of Siegen is researching how popularity is changing our society.

By Dr Jörgen Schäfer

How does the perspective on a novel change once it has become a bestseller? And what does it mean for a “classic” if it hardly finds any readers? What consequences does it have for political decision-making when some “populist” messages reach millions while well-founded expertise goes unheard? And what does it mean for our culture if it is not primarily the quality of artefacts that counts, but their position in charts and rankings or the number of clicks, likes and views they generate on social media? Questions like these are the focus of the Collaborative Research Centre (CRC) 1472 “Transformations of the Popular”, an interdisciplinary research network at the University of Siegen funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) since 2021, which investigates how the popular is changing our society.

A new definition of the popular

“Popular is what is recognised by many” - this is the research network's deliberately simple nominal definition. This formulation may sound banal at first, but it has a remarkable analytical power. This is because it breaks away from the normative attributions that traditionally accompany the word “popular”: popular or hated, valuable or worthless, high culture or mass entertainment. Instead, the SFB is initially interested in the simple, quantitative dimension: Is something being watched by many people - or not?

This perspective opens up a new view of cultural and social phenomena. Because who or what attracts attention has consequences for who or what is considered important, relevant or legitimate. A musician whose songs are streamed millions of times gains a cultural significance that is independent of aesthetic criteria. A scientific paper that is cited thousands of times has a stronger impact on a field of research than possibly more original or more well-founded works that are less recognised. A political movement that brings thousands onto the streets can no longer be ignored - even if its demands are controversial.

Two forms of popularisation

In order to better understand these dynamics, the Siegen researchers distinguish between two basic forms of popularisation. First-order popularisation describes deliberate strategies to make something accessible to a broad audience. Scientists write popular science books, artists adapt their works to mass taste, politicians formulate complex programs in catchy slogans. The subject matter is deliberately changed, simplified, adapted - so that it can be noticed and, it is hoped, understood by many. This is because those who pursue these strategies believe that this is what should happen.

“Second-order popularisation” works differently: it is about the observation of attention by many that is comprehensible to all: Charts and rankings, bestseller lists and click figures, follower counts and survey results make it possible to measure and publicly display what is being noticed by many. This visualisation of popularity itself has transformative power: a song that is in the charts becomes even more interesting as a result. A book on the bestseller list sells better. A tweet with lots of likes attracts more attention.

These two forms of popularisation can come into conflict. What has been specially prepared for a broad audience does not automatically attract attention. And what actually becomes popular does not always correspond to the ideas of those who want to determine what should attract attention.

This is a central thesis of the SFB: In modern societies, the burden of proof has been reversed. Traditionally, the popular had to justify itself: Why bother with mass entertainment when there is sophisticated art, serious science, legitimate politics? This hierarchy begins to falter when popularity itself becomes a resource for legitimisation. Then the question is the other way round: why should something that is not popular attract attention? Why should we visit a museum (or finance it with taxpayers' money) whose exhibitions only interest a few people? Why read a book that nobody knows? Why trust a science that hardly anyone understands?

Problematised popularity

This reversal has far-reaching consequences. It affects not only culture, but also politics, science, medicine, religion and education. Wherever expertise, tradition or institutional authority used to provide legitimacy, there is now pressure to justify oneself: why should we pay attention to something when so few others do? And why should we ignore what is undeniably popular?

This question is particularly explosive because it confirms democratic principles - after all, it is about “the many”. At the same time, it threatens to undermine structures and institutions that do not rely on mass approval, but on other qualities. Popularity is not always desirable from the perspective of experts, administrations, politicians and 'elites'. Not everything that is de facto observed by many should be observed at all from the point of view of certain actors: Conspiracy narratives sometimes go viral; populist movements form that mobilise thousands; medical misinformation is shared millions of times over. In all these cases, popularity becomes a problem - precisely because it is so difficult to ignore.

A fundamental conflict arises: what grounds can be used to delegitimise something that is widely respected? How can we demand that something should not be recognised when it is already demonstrably popular? The classic strategies - banning, censorship, depopularisation - themselves come under pressure to justify themselves. After all, who decides what “the many” are allowed to pay attention to and what not?

The SFB analyses such tensions as controversies of the popular. In a society in which the distribution of attention is becoming ever more transparent, in which counters and displays, rankings and surveys are omnipresent, it becomes clear that some things receive attention that should not - and other things that should actually receive attention do not. These asymmetries create tensions that are then often perceived as “polarisation” or “division”.

Cultivated attention and the distribution of attention

A central observation of the SFB is that attention is not simply measured or increased - it is cultivated. Platform operators curate what their users get to see. Algorithms decide which content is visible. Cultural institutions endeavour to cultivate their audience. Scientists cultivate their networks, politicians their follower numbers.

This cultivation of attention is time-consuming. It requires strategies, resources and infrastructure. And it leads to an unequal distribution of attention: a few things are noticed by a great many people, while a great many things are hardly noticed or not noticed at all. This distribution does not follow the old hierarchies of high culture and popular culture. It follows the logic of platforms, algorithms and network effects. Once you get attention, it's easier to get more. Those who have none remain invisible.

Three research areas

The CRC divides its research into three areas that examine different facets of these transformations:

The Pop area explores aesthetic forms and practices that consciously break away from commitments to meaning and high cultural traditions. Pop legitimises itself through popularity, not through art-historical significance. A superhero comic or a pop song does not have to have a deeper message - it is enough that many people like it. This self-legitimisation of the popular has fundamentally changed the cultural landscape since the 1950s.

The area of popularisation examines strategies for disseminating knowledge: How are scientific findings, historical knowledge and cultural education made accessible to a broad audience? And what happens when these efforts fail - when the audience fails to turn up, when other content becomes more popular than that which is supposed to attract attention?

Finally, the Populisms section analyses political conflicts over the distribution of attention. When populist actors refer to “the many”, when they accuse elites of ignoring the majority, when they attack institutions that are not popular enough - then popularity becomes a highly political category. The transformations of the popular are never complete. With the further development of digital platforms, the use of artificial intelligence and the automation of attention measurement, new dynamics are constantly emerging. The CRC is not researching these processes with cultural pessimism or technological euphoria, but with analytical sobriety: How does the popular work? What mechanisms are at work? What are the consequences of the distribution of attention?

The answers to these questions are not simple. They cannot be: “The masses are always wrong”. Rather, it is about understanding the complexity of the transformations - and thus creating a basis for a reflective approach to the popular. Because one thing is certain: the question of what attracts the attention of many is shaping culture, politics and almost all areas of life more than ever before.

Co-operation with HELLERAU

The Siegen research network itself practices what it investigates: Science communication as a negotiation of attention. With podcasts, blog posts, workshops and public events, the SFB endeavours to be understandable to more than just a specialist audience. Because if popularity is indeed transforming our society, then this affects not only science, but all citizens: What is considered important? Whose voice is heard? Which topics determine the public debate?

The collaboration between the Siegen SFB and HELLERAU, the European Centre for the Arts, is therefore an obvious choice. The “Make it Pop!” festival, which HELLERAU is presenting in May and June 2026, shows artistic strategies for dealing with the popular: How do contemporary artists use popular forms? How do they position themselves between mass culture and artistic aspirations? How do they deal with the fact that their audience may pay attention to completely different phenomena?

The artistic positions shown in this program - from the Groupe Acrobatique from Tangier to the choreographer Salia Sanou from Burkino Faso and the dance ensemble tanzmainz - demonstrate this: The popular is not a contradiction to art. Rather, it is a material that can be worked with - and that unfolds its own transformative power.

The SFB will accompany these artistic strategies and discuss them in dialogue with artists and the audience: What does it mean today to be popular - or to consciously not want to be popular? Can art escape the logic of attention? Should it do so at all?

The Collaborative Research Centre 1472 “Transformations of the Popular” has been funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) since 2021. Researchers from the fields of literature, cultural and media studies, sociology, political science, history, theology, musicology and other disciplines are involved. Collaborative Research Centres are long-term research institutions at universities that run for up to twelve years and enable innovative, challenging, complex and long-term research projects to be carried out

Dr Jörgen Schäfer is scientific coordinator in the CRC "Transformations of the Popular" and head of the sub-project A06 "Pop, Literature and New Sensibility".