Markus received his PhD from the University of Bochum in 2024, where he held a position at the Hegel-Archiv until 2025. His current research focuses on the social dependence of the imaginative dimension of human life. He is the managing editor of Hegel-Studien and has published on topics including Hegel, theories of ideology, and Critical Theory.
Dr. Markus Gante
Period at the center: October 25 – March 26
Research Project: The Sociality of Imagination
Email: Markus.gante@rub.de
WebsiteResearch Project
The Sociality of Imagination
My main areas of research are the connections between historical positions (Kant, Hegel) and contemporary social philosophy.
Currently, I am working on a socio-philosophical understanding of the imaginative dimension of human life. While imagination has classically been conceived as an individual faculty, there is a growing interest in conceptualizing so-called social imaginaries as shared background understandings within societies. My current research project explores the connection between imagination as an individual capacity and its social dimension by conceiving it as an integral part of the ordering of experience. I do so by bringing classical theories (Kant, Hegel) into dialogue with contemporary conceptions of social imaginaries and meaning-based systems (Castoriadis, Taylor, Luhmann).
Selected publications
Articles
“Spirit as a Riddle to Itself. Symbolic Art and the Deep History of Freedom“, in: Hegel Bulletin 46:1 (2023), 25–46.
“From False Consciousness to Functional Necessities. Rethinking Ideology Critique“, in: European Journal of Social Theory 28:2 (2025), 282–298.
Monograph
Das Wissen der Freiheit. Hegels Theorie des absoluten Geistes (Hamburg: Meiner, forthcoming).