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Prof. dr. E.A. (Elizabeth) Buettner

Modern History
Faculty of Humanities
Geschiedenis
Photographer: Jeroen Oerlemans

Visiting address
  • Kloveniersburgwal 48
  • Room number: D 0.05
Postal address
  • Postbus 1610
    1000 BP Amsterdam
  • Profile

    Elizabeth Buettner, Professor of Modern History

    Elizabeth Buettner has been Professor of Modern History at the University of Amsterdam since 2014.  Her research has centered on British imperial, social, cultural, and migration history since the late nineteenth century along with other European nations’ histories of late colonialism, decolonization, and their domestic ramifications.  Key publications include Empire Families: Britons and Late Imperial India (Oxford University Press, 2004) together with articles in Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales, Journal of Modern History, Itinerario, History & Memory, Scottish Historical Review, Annales de Démographie Historique, Women’s History Review, Ab Imperio, Food and History, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, and BMGN-Low Countries Historical Review.  She has also contributed to a number of edited collections, including The Cambridge History of Global Migrations Vol. II, The Oxford Handbook of the Ends of Empire, A Concise Companion to History, and Settlers and Expatriates: Britons Over the Seas.  In her book Europe After Empire: Decolonization, Society and Culture (Cambridge University Press, 2016), she examined British, French, Dutch, Belgian and Portuguese histories of coming to terms with the end of empires after the Second World War, focusing on the domestic impact of decolonization, postcolonial migration, the emergence of multicultural societies, and selective memories of empire.

    Professor Buettner received her BA from Barnard College of Columbia University and her MA and PhD from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.  Before arriving in Amsterdam she taught in England at the University of York between 2000 and 2013, and in 2012-2013 held a Senior Research Fellowship at the Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies in Germany in conjunction with a British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship.  Her research has also been supported by a Senior Research Fellowship at the Leibniz Institute for European History in Mainz and a Visiting International Fellowship at the University of Exeter.  She was recently part of a three-year European Commission-funded Horizon 2020 Project, ‘European Colonial Heritage Modalities in Entangled Cities’ (ECHOES).  Together with Britta Timm Knudsen, John Oldfield, and Elvan Zabunyan, she co-edited and contributed to a collection that emerged from this initiative entitled Decolonizing Colonial Heritage: New Agendas, Actors and Practices in and beyond Europe (Routledge, 2022).

  • Publications

    2023

    • Buettner, E. (2023). Europe's Postcolonial Migrations since 1945. In M. J. Borges, & M. Y. Hsu (Eds.), The Cambridge History of Global Migrations: Migrations, 1800-Present (Vol. 2, pp. 180-198). (The Cambridge History of Global Migrations). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108767071.012 [details]

    2022

    • Buettner, E. (2022). Europe and Its Entangled Colonial Pasts: Europeanizing the 'Imperial Turn'. In B. Timm Knudsen, J. Oldfield, E. Buettner, & E. Zabunyan (Eds.), Decolonizing Colonial Heritage: New Agendas, Actors and Practices in and beyond Europe (pp. 25-43). (Critical heritages of Europe). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003100102-3 [details]
    • Buettner, E. (2022). Migration and European History’s Global Turn. Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales - English Edition, 76(4), 1-20. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1017/ahsse.2022.7
    • Timm Knudsen, B., Oldfield, J., Buettner, E., & Zabunyan, E. (2022). Introduction. In B. Timm Knudsen, J. Oldfield, E. Buettner, & E. Zabunyan (Eds.), Decolonizing Colonial Heritage: New Agendas, Actors and Practices in and beyond Europe (pp. 1-21). (Critical heritages of Europe). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003100102-1 [details]
    • Timm Knudsen, B., Oldfield, J., Buettner, E., & Zabunyan, E. (Eds.) (2022). Decolonizing Colonial Heritage: New Agendas, Actors and Practices in and beyond Europe. (Critical heritages of Europe). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003100102 [details]

    2021

    2020

    2019

    • Buettner, E. (2019). European Entanglements. In C. Andersen, B. T. Knudsen, & C. Kølvraa (Eds.), Keywords/ECHOES: Anthology Exploring the Keywords of Colonial Heritage http://keywordsechoes.com. http://keywordsechoes.com
    • Buettner, E. (2019). Herinneren, herhalen: Koloniale erfenissen in de politiek: [Bespreking van: R. Gildea (2019) Empires of the Mind : The Colonial Past and the Politics of the Present]. De Nederlandse Boekengids, 4(5), 38. [details]
    • Buettner, E. (2019). How Unique is Britain’s Empire Complex? In S. Ward, & A. Rasch (Eds.), Embers of Empire in Brexit Britain (pp. 37-47). Bloomsbury Academic. https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350113831.ch-004 [details]
    • Buettner, E. (2019). Remembering and Repeating: How Colonialism Continues to Influence Politics: [Review of: R. Gildea (2019) Empires of the Mind : The colonial past and the politics of the present]. Times Literary Supplement, 6063, 26. http://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A631895561/AONE?u=amst&sid=bookmark-AONE&xid=636c128b [details]

    2018

    2017

    2016

    • Buettner, E. (2016). Europe after Empire: Decolonization, Society, and Culture. (New Approaches to European History). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [details]

    2014

    • Buettner, E. (2014). 'This is Staffordshire not Alabama': Racial Geographies of Commonwealth Immigration in Early 1960s Britain. Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 42(4), 710-740. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/03086534.2014.962929 [details]

    2013

    • Buettner, E. (2013). Ethnizität. In U. Rublack (Ed.), Die Neue Geschichte. Eine Einführung in 16 Kapiteln (pp. 322-350). Fischer Verlag.
    • Buettner, E. (2013). Three Weeks’ Post Apart: British Children Travel the Empire. In M. Taylor (Ed.), The Victorian Empire and Britain’s Maritime World, 1837-1901: The Sea and Global History (pp. 129-148). London: Palgrave Macmillan.

    2012

    • Buettner, E. (2012). “Going for an Indian”: South Asian Restaurants and the Limits of Multiculturalism in Britain. In K. Ray, & T. Srinivas (Eds.), Curried Cultures: Globalization, Food, and South Asia (pp. 143-174). (California Studies in Food and Culture). University of California Press.

    2011

    • Buettner, E. (2011). Ethnicity. In U. Rublack (Ed.), A Concise Companion to History (pp. 247-267 and 419-422 (endnotes)). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
    • Buettner, E. (2011). La famille britannique entre l’Inde et le Canada: Empire, classe sociale et voyage à la fin du xix e siècle. Annales de Démographie Historique, 122(2), 149-168.
    • Buettner, E. (2011). “Setting the Record Straight?”: Imperial History in Postcolonial British Public Culture. In U. Lindner, M. Möhring, M. Stein, & S. Stroh (Eds.), Hybrid Cultures—Nervous States: Britain and Germany in a (Post)Colonial World (pp. 89-104). Brill Rodopi.

    2010

    • Buettner, E. (2010). “We Don’t Grow Coffee and Bananas in Clapham Junction You Know!”: Imperial Britons Back Home. In R. Bickers (Ed.), Settlers and Expatriates: Britons Over the Seas (pp. 302-328). (Oxford History of the British Empire Companion Series). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    2009

    • Buettner, E. (2009). Chicken Tikka Masala, Flock Wallpaper, and “Real” Home Cooking: Assessing Britain’s “Indian” Restaurant Traditions. Food & History, 7(2), 203-29.
    • Buettner, E. (2009). Family. In A. Iriye, & P-Y. Saunier (Eds.), Palgrave Dictionary of Transnational History (pp. 377-379). London: Palgrave Macmillan.
    • Buettner, E. (2009). Riding the Elephant or Riding the Bus: Britons, India, and Elite Status in the Late Imperial Era. In C. Laux, F.-J. Ruggiu, & P. Singaravélou (Eds.), Au sommet de l’Empire: les élites européennes dans les colonies (XVIe-XXe siècle) (pp. 219-235). P.I.E. Peter Lang.
    • Buettner, E. (2009). “Would You Let Your Daughter Marry a Negro?”: Race and Sex in 1950s Britain. In P. Levine, & S. R. Grayzel (Eds.), Gender, Labour, War and Empire: Essays on Modern Britain (pp. 219-237). Palgrave Macmillan.

    2008

    • Buettner, E. (2008). Письма почтальона: дистанционная интим- ность и семейная жизнь индийских колонизаторов (The Postman’s Letters: Long Distance Intimacy and the Family Lives of India’s Colonizers). Ab Imperio, 2/2008, 47-79.
    • Buettner, E. (2008). “Going for an Indian”: South Asian Restaurants and the Limits of Multiculturalism in Britain. Journal of Modern History, 80(4), 865-901.

    2007

    • Buettner, E. (2007). Fatherhood Real, Imagined, Denied: British Men in Imperial India. In T. L. Broughton, & H. Rogers (Eds.), Gender and Fatherhood in the Nineteenth Century (pp. 178-189). Palgrave Macmillan.

    2006

    • Buettner, E. (2006). Cemeteries, Public Memory, and Raj Nostalgia in Postcolonial Britain and India. History and Memory, 18(1), 5-42.

    2004

    • Buettner, E. (2004). Empire Families: Britons and Late Imperial India. Oxford University Press.

    2002

    • Buettner, E. (2002). Haggis in the Raj: Private and Public Celebrations of Scottishness in Late Imperial India. Scottish Historical Review, LXXXI(2), 212-39.

    2001

    • Buettner, E. (2001). From Somebodies to Nobodies: Britons Coming Home from India. In M. Daunton, & B. Rieger (Eds.), Meanings of Modernity: Britain from the Late-Victorian Era to the Second World War (pp. 221-240). Berg.

    2000

    • Buettner, E. (2000). Problematic Spaces, Problematic Races: Defining “Europeans” in Late Colonial India. Women's History Review, 9(2), 277-97.

    1999

    • Buettner, E. (1999). Parent-Child Separations and Colonial Careers: The Talbot Family Correspondence in the 1880s and 1890s. In A. Fletcher, & S. Hussey (Eds.), Childhood in Question: Children, Parents, and the State (pp. 115-132). Manchester University Press.

    2021

    • Buettner, E. (2021). [Review of: R. Eyerman, G. Sciortino (2020) The Cultural Trauma of Decolonization: Colonial Returnees in the National Imagination]. Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis, 18(2), 166-169. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.52024/tseg10843 [details]

    2016

    • Buettner, E. (2016). Worrying about Migration: Episodes in Western European History since 1945. (Inaugural lecture; No. 566). Universiteit van Amsterdam. [details]

    Prize / grant

    • Buettner, E. (2019). Visiting International Academic Fellowship, University of Exeter, May 2019.
    • Buettner, E. (2017). European Commission Horizon 2020 Consortium Project, 'European Colonial Heritage Modalities in Entangled Cities' (ECHOES). http://projectechoes.eu
    • Buettner, E. (2017). Senior Research Fellowship, Leibniz Institute for European History, Mainz, Germany, November-December 2017.
    • Buettner, E. (2012). British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship, January-December 2013.
    • Buettner, E. (2012). Senior Research Fellowship, Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS), Germany, October 2012-June 2013.
    • Buettner, E. (2006). International Research Seminar on Decolonization, sponsored by the National History Center, Mellon Foundation, and Library of Congress, Washington, DC, 10 July-4 August 2006.
    • Buettner, E. (2005). Joint Winner, Annual Women’s History Network Book Prize for 2004.
    • Buettner, E. (2005). Shortlisted for Young Academic Author of the Year, Times Higher Education Supplement Awards.
    • Buettner, E. (2004). Elected as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.
    • Buettner, E. (2004). British Academy Small Research Grant.
    • Buettner, E. (2002). AHRB (now AHRC) Research Leave Scheme: awarded an additional term of leave to complete book manuscript ('Empire Families'), January-March 2003.
    • Buettner, E. (2001). David Berry Prize for Scottish History, awarded for ‘Haggis in the Raj: Private and Public Celebrations of Scottishness in Late Imperial India’, Scottish Historical Review, LXXXI, 2: No. 212 (October 2002), pp. 212-39..
    • Buettner, E. (1999). Past and Present Postdoctoral Fellowship for 1999-2000 (declined).
    • Buettner, E. (1996). Royal Historical Society Centenary Research Fellowship (1996-1997).
    • Buettner, E. (1994). Mellon Dissertation Fellowship (1994-1995).

    Membership / relevant position

    • Buettner, E. (2017-2021). Member of the Wetenschappelijke Adviescommissie/Academic Advisory Commission for the ‘Decolonization, Violence, and War in Indonesia, 1945-1950’ Investigation. This research programme has been allocated c. €4 million by the Dutch government, and is coordinated by the Koninklijk Instituut voor Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde (KITLV), the Nederlands Instituut voor Militaire Historie (NIMH) and the NIOD Instituut voor Oorlogs-, Holocaust en Genocidestudies. (2017-2021).
    • Buettner, E. (2015). Danish Council for Independent Research (DFF), Member of History International Review Panel (2015), Danish Council for Independent Research (DFF).
    • Buettner, E. (2015-2021). Member of Advisory Council (2015-2021); Research Associate (since 2010), Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London.

    Media appearance

    • Buettner, E. (13-06-2021). Gandhi@150: O 'Mahatma' como um ícone global celebrado e contestad [Print] Público, P2 Sunday Supplement. Gandhi@150: O 'Mahatma' como um ícone global celebrado e contestado. https://www.publico.pt/2021/06/13/culturaipsilon/ensaio/mahatma-icone-global-celebrado-contestado-1964670
    • Buettner, E. (01-10-2020). ‘Activisme rond het koloniale verleden dwingt de erkenning van een nieuwe realiteit af’: interview met Elizabeth Buettner door Miel Groten [Web] Platform WO2: WO2 Onderzoek Uitgelicht. ‘Activisme rond het koloniale verleden dwingt de erkenning van een nieuwe realiteit af’: interview with Elizabeth Buettner by Miel Groten, Platform WO2: WO2 Onderzoek Uitgelicht 9, no. 4 (2020), https://www.tweedewereldoorlog.nl/onderzoekuitgelicht/dekolonisatie/elizabeth-buettner-activisme-rond-het-koloniale-verleden-dwingt-de-erkenning-van-een-nieuwe-realiteit-af/. https://www.tweedewereldoorlog.nl/onderzoekuitgelicht/dekolonisatie/elizabeth-buettner-activisme-rond-het-koloniale-verleden-dwingt-de-erken…
    • Buettner, E. (05-11-2017). ‘Mesmo hoje, minorias nascidas na Europa são tidas como “imigrantes de segunda geração”’ [Print] Público. ‘Mesmo hoje, minorias nascidas na Europa são tidas como “imigrantes de segunda geração”’.
    • Buettner, E. (02-06-2016). ‘Toon migratiedebat was altijd al: ze zijn anders’: interview with Elizabeth Buettner by Ianthe Sahadat [Print] De Volkskrant. ‘Toon migratiedebat was altijd al: ze zijn anders’: interview with Elizabeth Buettner by Ianthe Sahadat, De Volkskrant (Amsterdam), 2 June 2016.
    • Buettner, E. (13-01-2016). 'Free Thinking' [Radio] BBC Radio 3. BBC Radio 3: ‘Free Thinking’: one of four interviewed guests for a live 45-minute panel discussion on ‘French Politics and Society’ broadcast on 13 January 2016.

    Journal editor

    • Buettner, E. (editor) (2020-2025). Twentieth Century British History (Journal).
    • Buettner, E. (member of editorial board) (2017-2027). Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History (Journal).
    • Buettner, E. (member of editorial board) (2005-2027). Women's History Review (Journal).

    Others

    • Buettner, E. (participant) (2013 - 2018). Member of International Advisory Board, ‘Embers of Empire: The Receding Frontiers of Post-Imperial Britain’, Collaborative Research Project headed by Professor Stuart Ward and sponsored by the Velux Foundation, Copenhagen University, Denmark (January 2013-December 2015, and continuing through 2018) (other).

    2023

    • Hayuningsih, A. A. C. (2023). The Javanese diaspora in New Caledonia: From indentured labourers to a fractured community. [Thesis, fully internal, Universiteit van Amsterdam]. [details]
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  • Ancillary activities
    • No ancillary activities