Location: Amsterdam 
Max hours per week: 38,00
Max salary: € 3.247,-
Duration of agreement: 4 years
Apply until: 08/20/2023

The research group NL-Lab of the  KNAW Humanities Cluster in Amsterdam invites applications for a four-year PhD position on a new NWO funded research project about the animal turn in (socio)linguistics. The title of the project is Towards an Animal Turn in Sociolinguistics. Understanding the dairy cow’s interaction with humans and with each other. NL-Lab is a research group of the Humanities Cluster (https://nl-lab.net/en/).

Project

The goal of this project is to provide proof of principle for an animal turn in sociolinguistics, i.e., for an inclusive sociolinguistics that does not separate human and non-human animals on the basis of the language criterion, but instead studies interactions between animals, and between animals and humans in a wide context. The project focuses on dairy cows. In conformity with careful ethnographic fieldwork, the project will find out how different herds of dairy cows, with different relationships with humans, imbue their interaction with meaning that makes sense for both dairy cows and humans under specific social conditions. The main investigative challenge is to understand intraspecies and interspecies interactions as embodied, multimodal and sensory phenomena. Examining the local meaning-making by the dairy cow allows sociolinguistics to critically reflect on their ideologies towards animal interactions within power dynamics which would position sociolinguistics in the current interspecies ethics debate in the Anthropocene. The project will address three research problems in (socio)linguistic research: (i) how to decentre the human, both theoretically and methodologically, especially within the strongly asymmetrical dairy cow/human power relations, (ii) how to examine multimodal behaviour by cows, and (iii) how to fill the gap of knowledge in linguistics about the animal’s interactional and communicative expressions.

Profile

Applications are invited from candidates with the following qualifications:

• You have a research master’s degree in Linguistics or Linguistic Anthropology, and a linguistic training at the BA and MA level;
• You have a strong interest in the field of qualitative sociolinguistics and are familiar with Conversation Analysis or willing to learn CA;
• You have experience with ethnographic or at least empirical fieldwork;
• You are sensitive to power dynamics between human and other animal species, especially so-called production animals and you like to collaborate in a team;
• You have analytical skills and a passion for doing research and will bring in an open-minded and collaborative attitude towards groundbreaking linguistic research;
• You have a good command of speaking and writing skills in both Dutch and English; if English only, the candidate is expected to obtain an active working proficiency of the Dutch language (B2 or C1 level) in the first year.

What we are offering

You will be working at NL-Lab, an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research group at KNAW Humanities Cluster in Amsterdam founded by Huygens ING and the Meertens Institute in 2019. NL-Lab conducts research on Dutch culture and identity in the past and present. With the aid of innovative research methods, NL-Lab brings together expertise from different fields to develop new perspectives on pressing questions (https://nl-lab.net/projecten/koe-taal/). During the project, you will be working towards your PhD and receive further training at the Netherlands National Graduate School of Linguistics (LOT), and insights from many angles of linguistic research. You will be part of a devoted and enthusiastic research team including (inter)national colleagues from different disciplines (biology, ethology, veterinary etc.).

Your workplace

Our offices are located in a historical building in downtown Amsterdam. Researchers work together on projects and a shared office space. NL-Lab aims to be an open and inquisitive, safe work environment where your input counts, not your job title. We value open exchanges of research ideas, theoretical frameworks and methodologies.

For more information

Please contact: Prof. Dr. Leonie Cornips, principal investigator of the dairy cow project: leonie.cornips@meertens.knaw.nl

Application procedure

Please submit your application before 20 August 2023:

• your RMA thesis,
• CV,
• A cover letter that includes a motivation on why you want to work on this project, why you wish to become a PhD candidate and a 1-page research proposal fitting the project description.

Interviews will take place beginning of September. For this job, you must be willing to move to the Netherlands.

About HuC

The KNAW Humanities Cluster stands for innovative and interdisciplinary research in the humanities and heritage sector. KNAW Humanities Cluster is a collaboration of three KNAW institutes: Huygens Institute for the History and Culture of the Netherlands, International Institute of Social History (IISH) and Meertens Institute. In these institutes, we conduct pioneering and excellent humanities research (history, ethnology, literature, linguistics) using innovative methods in which informatics plays an important role. The business office of the KNAW Humanities Cluster supports these three institutes, as well as the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study (NIAS) and the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation (NIOD), in their operational management. The KNAW Humanities Cluster has placed its operational management in a central business office and has a joint department for Digital Infrastructure, a Digital Humanities Lab and NL Lab.

Terms of employment

Depending on education and experience the minimum salary is € 2.541,00 and the maximum salary is € 3.247,00 gross per month for a full-time appointment (scale P cao Nederlandse Universiteiten/KNAW). This is exclusive of 8% vacation allowance, 8.3% year-end bonus, travel allowance, internet allowance, home working allowance and pension accrual with ABP. The KNAW offers its staff an excellent package of secondary benefits. A package that meets the different needs of employees depending on their stage of life, lifestyle or career ambitions. For example, by working an extra two hours a week, it is possible to increase the number of days off from 29 to 41 days a year (with full-time employment).

For a complete overview of the terms of employment, please refer to the web page: werken bij de KNAW.

Diversity & Inclusion

The KNAW considers a working environment in which everyone feels welcome and appreciated of great importance. A working environment in which attention is paid to individual quality and where development opportunities are paramount. Together we strive for an inclusive culture in which we embrace differences. We would therefore like to invite candidates who want to contribute to this through their background and experience. In the event of equal suitability, preference will be given to the candidate who thus enhances diversity within the Academy.

We will not respond to any supplier enquiries based on this job advertisement.