Gijs ten Berge is an external PhD candidate who graduated his master’s degree in History at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen in 2015. He wrote his thesis on the role of collective memory in Serbia in the run-up to the Balkan war of the early 1990s. After graduating, he started working as a researcher, analyst and customer journey specialist for several organizations that are occupied with sustainably retrofitting the built environment. His job inspired him to delve into the history of energy supply in the Netherlands, which brought together his academic interest in the role of collective memory and his professional interest in the execution of the contemporary energy transition.
Through several work-related projects, he came into contact with the TU/e department of the Built Environment. In 2021, he became part of the department of Technology, Innovation & Society as a PhD candidate. By applying the methods of collective memory studies to the cultural analysis of socio-technical transitions, he aims to contribute to the establishment of Historical Transition Studies as an integrated subject within Transition Studies. His PhD research deals with the study of the role of collective memory in the modernization of energy supply and the accompanied socio-technical transition to gas in the Dutch household in the 100 years between 1870 and 1970.