PhD Candidate/ Junior Researcher in the History of Philosophy and Science

Job description
Are you fascinated by history, religion, philosophy, and science? Then you have a part to play as a PhD Candidate / Junior Researcher. You will examine the institutional Catholic Church’s response to the seventeenth century’s new philosophical and scientific currents. Additionally, you will map the internal struggles taking place within the church and its institutions at that time.

The Center for the History of Philosophy and Science at Radboud University, Nijmegen, is looking for a PhD Candidate / Junior Researcher to write a PhD thesis on "Contesting modernity: The suppression of atomism 1640-1680" as part of a four-year PhD project (or a five-year project in case of part-time employment). The aim of the project is to examine the response of the institutional Catholic Church to the seventeenth century's new philosophical and scientific currents.

You will analyse a range of specific published, unpublished or censored documents composed in Italy in the period 1640 to 1680, which were written by members of the Catholic clergy and in one way or another responded to the question of atomism. A description of the project can be found here . You may deviate from the project description in accordance with your own research interests and talents. This project will be conducted in collaboration with the Università di Roma Tre and may involve research stays in Rome.

Requirements

• You have obtained a Master's degree in the history of philosophy or science or in intellectual history.
• You are acquainted with scholastic philosophy and terminology.
• You have some knowledge of early-modern atomism and corpuscularism.
• You are capable of reading Renaissance Latin (and preferably also Italian).
• Your English is sufficiently good to write a PhD in that language.
• You are a team worker, organiser, and an autonomous researcher.
• You are willing to take on a small amount of teaching (about 10%) in the domain of the history of philosophy.

Conditions of employment
Fixed-term contract: 4 or 5 years.

• Employment for 0.8 (5 year contract) - 1.0 FTE (4 year contract).
• The gross starting salary amounts to €2,434 per month based on a 38-hour working week, and will increase to €3,111 from the fourth year onwards (salary scale P ).
• You will receive 8% holiday allowance and 8.3% end-of-year bonus.
• You will be employed for an initial period of 18 months, after which your performance will be evaluated. If the evaluation is positive, the contract will be extended by 2.5 years (4 year contract) or 3.5 years (5 year contract).
• You will be able to use our Dual Career and Family Care Services . Our Dual Career and Family Care Officer can assist you with family-related support, help your partner or spouse prepare for the local labour market, provide customized support in their search for employment  and help your family settle in Nijmegen.
• Working for us means getting extra days off. In case of full-time employment, you can choose between 29 or 41 days of annual leave instead of the legally allotted 20.

Application procedure
You can apply until 30 September, exclusively using the application form . Kindly address your application to Christoph Lüthy. 

Click here for further information and the full vacancy text.