PhD researcher in the social history of material infrastructures @IISH

General description

The PHD position is part of a project on the social history of material infrastructures. This project examines how large-scale infrastructures such as roads, city walls, and bridges contributed to regional and empire-wide integration, but equally why and how processes of integration regularly broke down, and how large-scale infrastructure projects contributed to countervailing trends including local tensions, local autonomy, and cross-border regional formations. Read the project abstract here: The Lives and Afterlives of Imperial Material Infrastructure in Southeastern China

The doctoral student will be mainly responsible for 1) authoring a PHD thesis on the social history of material infrastructures; 2) collaborating with other members of the research team on data collection, annotation, curation, and analysis of city walls, roads or bridges; 3) learning new theoretical literatures and research methods and contributing to the joint research of all team members; 4) assisting in the organization of workshops and outreach events.

Job requirements

Candidates for this position should have a (research) master's degree in Chinese or East Asian history, archeology, or a related field in the humanities. In addition, you have:

• Intermediate to advanced reading skills in classical Chinese
• a strong interest in and ideally experience with digital research methods including text mining, GIS, network analysis, and machine learning
• a strong interest in and ideally experience with comparative historical research
• a cooperative attitude and willingness to engage in collaborative research
• excellent presentation and writing skills in English and Chinese
• enthusiasm and aptitude for public and oral history
• Dutch language ability is a plus

Appointment

The appointment concerns an employment contract of 1 fte for a period of four years. The start date is September 1, 2022, but the exact start date is negotiable.

Terms of employment

The gross monthly salary is €2.443 per month in the first year, rising to €3.122,-- in the fourth year, based on a fulltime appointment. The salary is supplemented with an 8% holiday allowance and an 8.3% end-of-year bonus. The Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities is applicable.

The Royal Academy of Science offers an attractive pension scheme, 6 weeks of holiday per year, the possibility to buy or sell holiday leave, as well as career development opportunities.

Additional information

For more information please contact Professor Hilde De Weerdt: hilde.de.weerdt@iisg.nl