Projects

Child separation: Politics and practices of children’s upbringing by faith‐based organisations in (post)colonial Indonesia (1808‐1984)

Not only in Australia and Canada, but also in the Dutch East Indies and Indonesia, groups of children were separated from their parent(s) to be fostered, adopted or raised in faith‐based children’s homes. This project analyses the entanglement of these practices with colonial and national politics, and traces the voices and perspectives of affected children and their descendants.

Children as Objects and Agents of Change. Strategies of (post)colonial development, 1880 - 2020

This project aims at collaboration between scholars from the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany to investigate how (post)colonial ‘civilizing’ and ‘development’ projects engaged children as their main objects and agents of change.

Christine Mohrmann (1903-1988). Scholar at the intersection of gender, religion and academic culture

In the context of the predominantly male academic culture, the classicist Christine Mohrmann was a remarkable phenomenon. Mohrmann was appointed the first female professor at the Catholic University in Nijmegen in 1953. This research project is focused on the construction of authority and the emotions with which these gendered constructions were defined, deployed and appropriated.

Colonialism Inside Out

In what way did coastal inhabitants of eighteenth-century Sri Lanka utilize Dutch legal, fiscal and religious institutions to further their own interests? And how did this everyday interaction contribute to the shaping of their lives? This interdisciplinary project takes a novel socio-legal approach to the history of colonialism by analysing the everyday interaction between an Asian society and an expanding European bureaucracy.

Distorting Mirrors: Appropriating Foreign Operettas in Dutch Urban Societies (1856-1914)

In the second part of the nineteenth century, operetta was extremely popular in the entire western world, and The Netherlands was no exception. With irony and satire, operettas depicted themes from everyday life in an absurd manner. This PhD project aims to unravel how and why nineteenth-century actors in the theatrical field appropriated foreign operettas catering for and impacting on various tastes and values, within a variety of Dutch urban contexts.

Faithful friends and filthy foes. A sensory and emotional history of human-animal interactions in Amsterdam (1840-1930)

Focusing on Amsterdam as a case study, this project aims to understand how and why the sensory and emotional dimensions of human-animal relationships substantially changed in the modernising urban context between 1840 and 1930.

Humour scandals in the Netherlands, 1950s-present

Ever since the rise of mass media in the mid-twentieth century, pieces of publicly broadcasted comedy have occasionally led to controversy. This project focusses specifically on humour scandals in the Netherlands, from the 1950s to the present day. In a book targeted at a larger audience that will be published by the Dutch publishing house Atlas Contact in 2023, eleven of these scandals will be analysed in chronological order.

IOW1819-Workshop Series (Indian Ocean World in the 18th and 19th centuries)

This workshop series aims to bring together both junior and senior scholars working on the Indian Ocean World in the 18th and 19th centuries. Every workshop focuses on a specific theme and is chaired by an expert in the field.

Making the colonial child visible. Children moving between Indo-European and local cultures on Netherlands New Guinea (1905-1962)

This PhD project examines how the Catholic mission addressed and engaged local children in the ‘civilising’ project on Netherlands New Guinea between 1905 and 1962 and what kinds of agency children developed in response. Practices shaped by encounters, interactions, and negotiations are analysed using a combination of textual and visual sources.

North American Indigenous Soldiers in the Netherlands during WWII

The research project "North American Indigenous Soldiers in the Netherlands during World War II" aims to identify and describe the participation of North American indigenous soldiers in the Netherlands during World War II.