The grant allows Dries Lyna to start up a new project for three postdoctoral researchers entitled "Economies of Trust? A New Digital Infrastructure on the Urban Poor in the Cape Colony", together with Eva Marie Lehner (University of Bonn) and Wouter Ryckbosch (Vrije Universiteit Brussel/Ghent University).
“For too long, colonial societies have been interpreted by historians as rigidly hierarchical and socially fragmented,” says Lyna. “With this project, we aim to challenge that narrative by asking how trust and credibility were built among the urban lower classes in diverse colonial settings. We’re particularly interested in the role of kinship, gender, and economic position in shaping social networks from the bottom up. Our goal is to write a new, more inclusive social history of European colonialism, one that acknowledges the resilience and agency of the urban poor, whose lives and strategies have often been overlooked.”
Lyna: “At a time when public discourse in both South Africa and Europe is increasingly shaped by rigid and racialized identities, our historical research offers a timely perspective. By uncovering what connected people in the past rather than what divided them, we hope to contribute critically to contemporary conversations about identity, community, and belonging.”