We are delighted to celebrate the founding of the Institute for Studies of Science (ISoS) as a Central Academic Institute at Bielefeld University. Our inaugural conference, “Science in Practice and in Society”, will be held at the Center for Interdisciplinary Research (ZiF) in Bielefeld on October 24, 2025.

The Institute for Studies of Science (ISoS) has recently been founded as a forum and research hub dedicated to the pursuit of integrated and interdisciplinary studies of science, medicine, and technology. ISoS integrates perspectives from philosophy, history and sociology to reflect on science and its relationship with society. Our programme is rooted in an interdisciplinary working mode, involving close collaboration with the sciences. At our inaugural conference, we will discuss interdisciplinary perspectives on the practice of science and its entanglement with society – and explore how these aspects are intertwined.