Joris van Eijnatten, NIAS-KB Fellow, will hold a seminar discussing conceptions of Europe in Dutch newspapers.

About the Seminar

Riding the wave of new technologies, public interest and political concern, ‘big data’ has become a catchword in current research funding policies. Computers have become extremely powerful, fancy visualisations impress laypeople, while politicians often believe that processing huge quantities of information will solve the many problems they need to deal with. The humanities, too, are part of a digital turn. But do humanities’ researchers need that turn? Does digital humanities actually produce new and useful knowledge? To answer these questions, I am conducting research into the way ‘Europe’ was framed in millions of twentieth-century Dutch newspaper articles made publicly available by the Dutch National Library (KB). I am looking at four aspects of Europe in particular: the mundane (weather forecasts, recipes, crossword puzzles), intellectual perspectives (political ideals, philosophical views), popular competitions (sports, music, pageants) and visions of unity (federalism, the construction of the EU). In this talk I will show some of the initial research results I have been able to obtain during my stay at NIAS.

About Joris van Eijnatten

Joris van Eijnatten is Professor of Cultural History at Utrecht University, and this year’s KB-Fellow. This seminar relates to his public KB Lecture in The Hague, which will be held in January.

About NIAS Seminars

NIAS Seminars are aimed to stimulate scientific cross-pollination within the NIAS academic community, but seminars are open to others who are interested. Please let us know if you wish to attend.