Eindhoven History Lab

Deep Transitions project SEMINAR 1: Introduction to the Project, Deep Transitions, Wellbeing and Sustainability
2021-10-08 08:00 - 17:00 (Europe/Amsterdam)
Johan Schot (Utrecht University) & Harry Lintsen (Eindhoven University of Technology)
8th October 2021
13.00-14.30
We are excited to announce that the first in a series of six seminars on the Deep Transitions Netherlands project will take place on 8 October, organized within the framework of the Strategic Alliance between Utrecht University, TU Eindhoven and Wageningen University & Research. The seminars are intended for interested parties to exchange ideas on the design of a research program on sustainability transitions in the Netherlands, which will be implemented by April 2022.
As you have expressed an interest in participating in these seminars, we hereby provide you with an overview of the content and form of the seminar. This serves as both a reading guide for background literature and an explanation of the seminar format.
Content – Reading Guide
This introductory seminar has three goals; firstly, we will introduce the Deep Transitions Project and our goals to develop a research agenda. We will then introduce the key theoretical and methodological notions of the program based on Deep Transitions and Wellbeing & Sustainability trade-offs literature. In the third part of the seminar we use break-out sessions to organize knowledge exchange and to stimulate discussion, which will be employed as an input in building our research agenda. We whole heartedly appreciate your attendance and ideas that you can contribute as part of the discussion.
The theory and methodology section of this seminar will incorporate discussion on the connection between notions of Deep Transitions and long-term analyses of wellbeing & sustainability. In short, Deep Transitions literature employs concepts of socio-technical systems, landscape, regime rules/metarules and niche emergence as spaces of innovation to understand and explain how new meta rules emerge, are implemented and stimulate simultaneous change across multiple socio-technical systems. The literature argues that radical change in multiple systems is required to achieve climate change, resource neutrality and societal equality goals. In its explanatory framework, this literature describes shows how the meta rules of the first deep transition, based on non-renewable resources and fuels, are the main causes for the current social and ecological challenges. The current framework lacks a coupling towards the impact of deep transitions and how sustainability is operationalized across socio-technical systems however. Long term analyses of wellbeing & sustainability can offer more in-depth information on the development of various aspects of sustainability (climate mitigation, nature development, global equality and so forth) and the trade-offs between such elements in time and space.

THE DEEP TRANSITIONS NETHERLANDS PROJECT
In the Deep Transitions in the Netherlands Project, the Eindhoven History Lab collaborates with researchers from Utrecht and Wageningen Universities to analyze the sociotechnical development of the Netherlands from a long-term perspective, and to simultaneously develop system transformation investments strategies for policy makers, industries and investors.
More info: see here.
EHL contact person: Frank Veraart
PHASE 1 Seminar schedule

October 8th 2021: Introduction to The Project, Deep Transitions, Wellbeing and Sustainability with Johan Schot (UU) & Harry Lintsen (TUe)
November 5th 2021: Qualitatively Researching Meta-rules and Systems with Bram Bouwens (UU) & Frank Veraart (TUe)
December 10th 2021: Quantitatively Researching Meta-rules and Systems with Johan Schot (UU) & Gaston Heimeriks (UU)
January 14th 2022: Interconnections between Systems with Harry Lintsen (TUe) & Erik van der Vleuten (TUe)
February 11th 2022: Deep Transitions, Wellbeing and Sustainability Dynamics with Jan-Pieter Smits (TUE/CBS) & Harry Lintsen (TUe)
March 11th 2022: The Second Deep Transition in the Making with Barbara van Mierlo (WUR) & Laurens Klerkx (WUR)
March 25th 2022: Transformative Investing in the Netherlands with Johan Schot (UU) & Bram Bouwens (UU)

The Deep Transitions Netherlands Project has been supported by Dasym Investment Strategies and the Utrecht University, TU Eindhoven, WUR and UMC Strategic Alliance.

PhD defense Henk-Jan Dekker: "Cycling Pathways: The Politics and Governance of Dutch Cycling Infrastructure, 1920-2020"
2021-09-30 16:00 | Auditorium, Senaatszaal
In an effort to fight climate change, many cities try to boost their cycling levels. They often look towards the Dutch for guidance. However, historians have only begun to uncover how and why the Netherlands became the premier cycling country of the world. Why were Dutch cyclists so successful in their fight for a place on the road? Cycling Pathways explores the long political struggle culminating in today’s high cycling levels. Delving into the archives, it uncovers the important role of social movements and shows in detail how these interacted with national, provincial and urban engineers and policymakers to govern the distribution of road space and construction of cycling infrastructure. It discusses a wide range of topics, ranging from activists to engineering committees, from urban commuters to recreational cyclists and from the early 1900s to today in order to uncover the long and all-but-forgotten history of Dutch cycling governance.

TU DELFT Lipkens Lecture : Technology, Societal Challenges and Global Sustainability History
2021-09-16 16:00 - 17:30 | TU Delft Library Central Hall
EHL’s Erik van der Vleuten will deliver the first lecture in the new Lipkens Lecture cycle at TU Delft. Maurits Ertsen (TUD) will act as commentator.
For more information please consult the TU Delft Studium Generale website.

Reflecting Technology in Academic Teaching
2021-07-27 08:00 - 2021-07-28 17:00 | Karlsruhe
Workshop on teaching environmental, societal, and ethical dimensions of technological change.
Deadline for submissions: March, 31th, 2021
Organisation: Rafaela Hillerbrand / Marcus Popplow (Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis & Institute for Technology Futures, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology)
Anna Antonova / Hanna Straß-Senol (Environmental Humanities Development, Rachel Carson Center, LMU Munich)
Karena Kalmbach / Andreas Spahn / Gunter Bombaerts (Eindhoven University of Technology)

Scientific and technological developments have manifold effects that often go beyond the specific problem they are designed to tackle, expanding to a range of social and environmental areas. To address this, fields like history and philosophy of technology, technology assessment, and environmental humanities all analyse the environmental, social, and ethical dimensions of technological change from various disciplinary backgrounds. Thereby, they foster critical reflection of (and sometimes a corrective to) scientific and technological advances. Although strong conceptual links exist between these different fields, their institutional and pedagogical practices have grown apart over the last decades. For an encompassing perspective on the issues discussed in these fields, reciprocal references need to be strengthened, both in research and in teaching. We hold that teaching, in particular, can profit from a multi- and interdisciplinary exchange between these fields.

To stimulate discussion on related issues, we are hosting a workshop in Karlsruhe in July 2021 to discuss good practices of interdisciplinary teaching that can foster reflexivity especially, if not exclusively, in the context of Technical Universities. The workshop is a milestone event of the newly founded KIT-Academy on Responsible Research, Teaching and Innovation, ARRTI, funded by the Excellence Strategy of German Universities, which aims to foster critical reflection amongst KIT students and researchers on their engineering and scientific practices. The workshop is organised in cooperation with colleagues at Eindhoven University of Technology and the LMU Munich.

We invite junior as well as senior lecturers from diverse disciplinary backgrounds to share their experiences in interdisciplinary teaching. We welcome presentations of experiences with particular courses and lectures at all levels – from introductory courses through project and practice-oriented seminars, to colloquia for Ph.D. students –as well as reflections on the conceptual didactical level for diverse groups of students from the humanities, social sciences, and engineering and natural sciences. Contributions are expected to be given in English.

Potential topics for presentations include

Challenges and strengths of interdisciplinary teaching
The role of humanities in education about technologies
Didactical best practices, educational methods and innovations
Experiences in teaching humanities to non-humanities students
The importance of critical reflection for technical universities
Measuring effect of humanities education in engineering curricula (motivation, critical thinking, competences, …)
Integrated curriculum approaches
…

The workshop continues a tradition of workshops on teaching the history of science and technology. Contributions to an earlier workshop at the Technical University Berlin may serve as a reference, accessible online (www.ksp.kit.edu/9783731509028, in German only). Recent workshops such as “Meeting the Challenge of Engineering Ethics” in Eindhoven in 2019 (https://www.sefi.be/2020/01/22/meeting-the-challenge-of-engineering-ethics-education-the-sefi-ethics-sig-workshop-2019/) and ”Teaching Environmental Humanities” at the Rachel Carson Center in Munich (https://www.carsoncenter.uni-muenchen.de/events_conf_seminars/event_history/2019-events-history/conferences2019/environmental-workshop/index.html) can also serve as an inspiration for potential participants.

Please send in your proposals for contributions (no more than 250 words, along with a brief CV) by March, 31st, 2021 to: technology_teaching@itz.kit.edu.

The final program will be published in May 2021. At the moment, we assume that the workshop cannot take place in person in Karlsruhe due to the Corona pandemic and will be organized as an online-event. If a hybrid format turns out to be possible, travel and accommodation costs will be covered for presenters who wish to come to Karlsruhe.

Please contact us for any questions that might arise at the mailing address mentioned above. We look very much forward to stimulating exchanges.

Rafaela Hillerbrand
Marcus Popplow

Tensions of Europe Digital Workshop Festival
2021-06-28 - 2021-07-02
The ToE network plans a digital workshop Festival (28 June-2 July 2021), filling the gap caused by postponing the 10th biennial ToE conference to 6-8 July 2022.
To the conference page

Join A Unique Series of Online Events from the 28th of June to the 2nd of July 2021:
The ToE network plans a digital workshop Festival (28 June-2 July 2021), filling the gap caused by postponing the 10th biennial ToE conference to 6-8 July 2022. The organization will be bottom-up; if you would like to plan, or are already planning, relevant international ToE-related events around that time, please consider connecting them to this initiative! Please note that you are free to decide the date and slot, theme within Tensions’ scope, format, participants, preferred platform in case you have one. For the sake of coherence, connections between and promotion of all initiatives, the management committee will act as programmer of this decentralized festival. We will supply a web environment and promotion of these bottom-up initiatives which will make up the 2021 Tensions of Europe digital workshop Festival.
Contact: Foundation for the History of Technology (SHT)
Organizers: Tensions of Europe network (you, if you like!)
Deadline: 31st of January for open session proposals; 28th of February for fully-fledged events
Date: 28 June – 2 July 2021
Fee: symbolic ;)
Place: Online
More information

KNHG Digital Congress
2020-11-19 10:00 - 16:30
In close collaboration with the Environmental Humanities Center at the VU University Amsterdam, KNHG is organizing a digital conference entitled ‘More than Human Past: Historians, Eco-history and Environmental Humanities.’ Our researchers Erik van der Vleuten and Frank Veraart make a contribution on this event.

Read more in Dutch

International workshop: Social-technical-environmental entanglements in the postcolonial Anthropocene
2020-11-10 08:00 - 2020-11-13 17:00 | digital workshop
This workshop is a follow-up to our 2019 workshop Resources, Infrastructures and the Anthropocene: global North-South dialogues“, in the context of our Global Sustainability history project. An international author team will meet to discuss draft versions for a special journal issue on the postcolonial Anthropocene.

Organizers: Evelien de Hoop (VU Amsterdam), Aarthi Sridhar (Dakshin Foundation/ University of Amsterdam), Claiton Marcio da Silva (Universidade Federal da Fronteira Sul), Erik van der Vleuten (Eindhoven History Lab).

SHOT Virtual Forum
2020-10-08 - 2020-10-11
Because of COVID-19, we are unable to meet as planned in person in New Orleans in 2020. Instead of our physical conference SHOT and HSS are now organizing a virtual conference that will take place 8-11 October.
More info

International Committee for the History of Technology ICOHTEC 2020 congress: A History of Technology for an Age of Crisis
2020-07-15 - 2020-07-17 | digital/ Eindhoven
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic the 47th Annual Meeting of ICOHTEC in Eindhoven took place virtually from 15-17 July 2020. The program offered an innovative mix of traditional and new session formats, plenary sessions, round tables, and social events. All contributions addressed the symposium theme ‘A History of Technology for an Age of Crisis’.
We thank all participants for their contributions! On the password protected part of this website you will be able to watch the recorded plenary and parallel sessions until 9 August 2020.
Sławomir Łotysz, President of ICOHTEC
Stefan Poser, Secretary General of ICOHTEC
Erik van der Vleuten, Jan Korsten, and Angelique Brons-Bakker, Local Organizing Committee Eindhoven

Conference website: https://icohtec2020eindhoven.org/
