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From January 2024, the four technical universities (Eindhoven University of Technology, Wageningen University & Research (both institutions also participating in the N.W. Posthumus Institute), Delft University of Technology, and University of Twente) are pooling their knowledge and expertise in the field of the history of technology in 4TU History of Technology. The new centre aims to provide students, engineers and the wider audience with a historical awareness of the role that technology and engineers played in societal transitions in the past two centuries, as well as to develop working methods that makes such knowledge actionable today. 4TU.History of Technology will stimulate and facilitate research, education and public debate on the role of technology in societal transitions then and now.

4TU.History of Technology facilitates and stimulates collaborative research in the history of technology and socio-environmental change. It focuses on the so-called twin green and digital transition(s), which currently sparks heated political, public and academic debate, and is pooling research as well as educational activities and initiatives of the four technical universities.

To this purpose, the Centre is currently developing an umbrella research agenda and network able to inspire research applications and host a plethora of collaborative research projects and other initiatives. The Centre organizes regular workshops, conferences, exchange visits and summer schools, and more and collaborates with international associations in the field.

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After having served successfully for several years as Research Network Coordinators of the Research Network ‘Life-Courses, Family, and Labour’, Paul Puschmann and Corinne Boter have decided to hand over their position to two successors. We are happy to inform you that Sanne Muurling and Evelien Walhout have accepted to act as new Research Network Coordinators. The network ‘Life-courses, Family, and Labour’ aims to bring together the fields of demographic and labour history to better understand the long-term development of populations, households, and the gender division of labour from the early modern age until the present.

We welcome both Sanne and Evelien as new Research Network Coordinators, and want to express our sincere thanks to Paul Puschmann and Corinne Boter for their succesful activities and initiatives as Research Coordinators over the past years.

Sanne Muurling is Assistant Professor of Social History, with an expertise in the dynamics of gender and social inequalities in the lives of ordinary people between 1600 and 1900. Through topics such as crime and mortality she asks how categories such as gender, socioeconomic status, single motherhood, migration background, or the place where someone lived determined what opportunities someone had in life. She obtained her PhD (2019) from the VU Amsterdam on her research on gender dynamics in crime in early modern Bologna, later also resulting in a book publication Everyday crime, criminal justice and gender in early modern Bologna (Brill Publishers, 2021). Since then, Sanne has been affiliated with the project ‘Lifting the burden of disease. The modernization of health in the Netherlands: Amsterdam 1854-1940’ and is an editor at TSEG – The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History.

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Evelien Walhout is Assistant Professor of Economic and Social History, with a special interest in historical demography and gender history. She obtained her PhD on morbidity and mortality patterns of infants and children in 19th and early 20th-century Netherlands in 2019 (Sociology, Tilburg University). She is also President of the International Committee for Historical Demography (ICHD), member of the board of the Yearbook of Women’s History, and affiliated member of the Radboud Group for Historical Demography and Family History in Nijmegen.

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You may have noticed it already, but the appearance of our website has been slightly redesigned. Because of the number of news items and because some messages appeared in several categories at the same time, messages appeared to get ‘out of sight’ (i.e. moved down the list) soon after their initial publication.

We hope to have solved this problem and have made the homepage a bit more structured by adding new categories: new are the respective lists with Calls and Positions at the bottom of the page. In the near future, we will also add more events to the Seminars overview. We hope you like this new look, suggestions for improvement remain however always welcome!

We are happy to inform you that Nicolas Brenninkmeijer has agreed to join the group of PhD representatives of the N.W. Posthumus Institute. The PhD Representatives represent the PhD participants enrolled in the PhD Training Programme of the N.W. Posthumus Institute. New developments and proposed changes related to the PhD Training are proposed to and discussed with the PhD representatives before final proposals are made and/or implemented.

Nicolas is member of the 2023 PhD Cohort of the N.W. Posthumus Institute and affiliated as PhD in the joint research project ‘Ancestor’s Tale: 200 years of inequality in Belgium’ of Vrije Universiteit Brussel and University of Antwerp. We are glad and grateful Nicolas has joined the group of PhD representatives.

Nicolas Brenninkmeijer	Cécile Bruyet	Silke Geven	Dinos Sevdalakis

On 28 March 2024, Posthumus alumna Arlinde Vrooman successfully defended her thesis ‘Here to Heal? The Effect of Colonial Rule on Disease and Health Care in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire: ca. 1900-1955’ at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the University of Groningen. Promotors are Professors Jutta Bolt and Herman de Jong (both University of Groningen).

We congratulate Arlinde with her PhD!

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