The project group hosts regular seminars, workshops and symposiums at the IISH and beyond. On this page, you can find information about upcoming events and how to sign up.
Workshop Colonial law, slavery and interactions (19 September 2025 – IISH Amsterdam)
More information and program at https://iisg.amsterdam/nl/events/colonial-law-slavery
Upcoming Seminar: October 2025
We warmly invite you to join the monthly seminar series Micro-Global Histories of Slavery: Sources and Approaches. Each session brings together scholars working on diverse regions and source materials to explore new methods and insights in the study of slavery. All seminars take place in a hybrid format (in person and online). If you would like to attend an upcoming seminar or be added to the mailing list, please email Sanne Muurling for details and updates.
We wish to draw your attention to the following seminar, beginning at 3:00 PM Central European Time (CET):
- 1 October 2025: Dependency, Bondage and Slavery in Northern Eurasia – Aleksandra Modelina & Angelina Kalashnikova
About the Seminar Series Micro-Global Histories of Slavery: Sources and Approaches
A global turn in slavery studies urges us to bring together the study of histories of slavery from across the globe, from Asia to the Atlantic, from local regimes of slavery to the impact of colonial slave trade and slavery.
Linked to the combined research team of slavery projects at the International Institute of Social History (Amsterdam) and Radboud University (Nijmegen), this seminar aims to further critical reflections of sources and approaches for the study micro-global histories of slavery. We invite scholars to share insights, questions and ideas that are grounded in research practice and experiences with colonial and other or vernacular sources. Discussing sources, research practices and methodologies thus serves as a way to further develop the practice of micro-global histories of slavery.
The seminar series is organized by a coalition of research and data projects at the IISH and the RU (1. Voices of Resistance: A Global Micro-Historical Approach to Enslavement across the Atlantic and Indian Ocean; 2. Resisting Enslavement: A Global Historical Approach to Slavery in the Dutch Atlantic and Asian Empire (1620-1815); 3. The Global Business of Slave Trade: Patterns, Actors and Gains in the Early Modern Dutch and Iberian Slave Trade and 4. Exploring Slave Trade in Asia).
Past events
Seminar Depok: A Story of (Im)material Heritage of Slavery – 22 July – Amsterdam
Workshop ESTA Network From slave trade to contract labour and shipping in Asia: Digital methods and collaboration – 9 May 2025 – Bonn
Symposium Koloniaal archief, slavernijverleden en voorouderonderzoek – 11 April 2025 – Amsterdam
Symposium Colonial archives and meaningful infrastructure – 24 January 2025 – Nijmegen
International Workshop Iberian Sources for the study of Slave Trade, Slavery and Colonialism in Asia – 21-22 January 2025 – Amsterdam
Past editions of the Seminar Series Micro-Global Histories of Slavery: Sources and Approaches
Nathan Marvin – Race, Racialisation, and Enslavement in the Indian Ocean World – 3 September 2025
Wouter Raaijmakers – Living in an Empire of Laws: Between Legislation and Litigation in the Indian Ocean World – 2 July 2025
Claude Chevaleyre and Koen van der Lijn – Contracted into slavery? Coerced labour in early modern China – 14 May 2025
Meenu Mathai and Susan Thomas – (Un)Making the Aṭima in Malabar/Kerala: Sources from the Syrian Christian Church Grantavari – 2 April 2025
Timo McGregor – Navigating Court Records and Legal Pluralism in Colonial Contexts – 5 March 2025
Titas Chakraborty – Studying enslaved mobilities in Asia – 18 February 2025
Nicholas Sy and Philipp Huber – Digital humanities using Iberian colonial parish registers – 4 December 2024
Eva Lehner and Hanna te Velde – Reading Enslaved Family Lives in Colonial Sources – 6 November 2024