PhD Candidate: Migrant Experiences of Space and Time in the Roman Empire

How did migrant workers experience their lives in the mines and stone quarries of the Roman Empire? Their lives are documented in finds from the settlements and graveyards surrounding their workplaces. You will use these finds to construct/reconstruct the everyday practices and experiences of time and/or space of these migrant workers, including both their journeys and their sense of belonging in their new as well as their home societies.

In this project, you will formulate your own research project within the broader subject of everyday practices and experiences of time and/or space, with a focus on migrant workers in the Roman Empire. The Romans extracted resources in large-scale mines and quarries across the provinces of the empire, until well into the fifth century. This induced a pressing need for labourers. These included free workers, enslaved people and convicted criminals, both female and male, from skilled engineers to unskilled work hands. Many of these must have been migrant workers, settling near the mining site. How did they experience their journey? What hopes or expectations drove their permanent or temporary migration? 'Did they maintain existing home practices or keep in touch with their place of origin? And if so, how? Did their settlement lead to the development of a distinct mining culture with its own spatial and temporal habits? To address these or related questions, you are invited to juxtapose case studies from different provinces or time periods in the Roman Empire.

Your research will be based on the existing literature on ancient evidence, such as material remains of settlements; finds such as ostraca, inscriptions, papyri, ingots, writing tablets, or plant remains; or existing isotope analyses. The position offers time to develop the skills needed to interpret this evidence: you are not expected to start with a full skill set. Because you are asked to construct/reconstruct a history of a group of people whose voices have been lost to us, you could use, for example, critical fabulation (Saidiya Hartman), an evidence-based way to formulate the narrative that best connects the available source material. You may build on complementary knowledge from other times or places, including autobiographical knowledge, which is why your proposal should also explain where you mean to look for such complementary information.

Your research will be embedded in the Radboud Institute for Culture & History (RICH), and you will be part of the Graduate School for the Humanities (GSH). You will devote 75% of your time to the research for and writing of your PhD thesis. The remaining 25% will be spent on training and academic service to the Faculty of Arts, including teaching.

We offer you the opportunity to develop and carry out your own PhD project within the areas of expertise of your supervisors, Dr Miriam Groen-Vallinga and Dr Anna Geurts. Your PhD supervisor will be Prof Olivier Hekster. The project will be funded by a Starter Grant from the Faculty of Arts awarded to Dr Miriam Groen-Vallinga and Dr Anna Geurts.