Huygens Institute and Institute of Netherlands History join forces
19 January 2011
New history institute is the largest humanities research institute in the Netherlands
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) have reached agreement on the establishment of a new institute in the field of Dutch history. NWO has transferred the Institute of Netherlands History to KNAW, which has merged it with its own Huygens Institute, thus creating the largest humanities institute in the Netherlands. The new institute employs about one hundred people. Expansion is a logical step given the increased importance of information technology to the humanities and the infrastructural costs associated with this.
The name of the new research institute is Huygens Institute of Netherlands History (Huygens ING). Historian Dr Henk Wals (56) is the new institute’s director. Wals used to be assistant director of the International Institute of Social History (IISG-KNAW) before he was appointed as the director of the Huygens Institute in 2005. Under his leadership, this institute became an innovative and successful research centre.
Huygens ING conducts research into the history of the Netherlands, with a focus on analysing historical sources and literary texts and rendering these accessible. As part of KNAW the institute conducts top research, often in collaboration with universities. In addition, the institute continuously develops activities for a wider public.
Information technology and digital text corpora play an important role at Huygens ING. The institute develops and uses new research methods and techniques for which historians and literary scholars work in close cooperation with IT specialists and programmers. With this approach, the institute wants to make a serious contribution to innovations in the area of computational humanities in the Netherlands.
Over the next few months Huygens ING will develop a clear structure and programme. The official launch is scheduled to take place in the mid-2011.
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For further information:
- Henk Wals, director Huygens Institute of Netherlands History
- t.: +31 70 331 58 00
