Puck de Boer MA

PhD candidate

Area(s) of interest: Gender, History of Emotions, Military history

Cohort/Start PhD: 2024-2025

Trials of Honour. Violence, masculinity and emotions in the modern Italian military (1861-1919)

University of Groningen
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Clemens Six and Dr. Francesco Buscemi
Start project: 1 September 2024

My PhD project aims to shed new light on the historical ties between the armed forces and the development of soldiers’ subjectivities and violent attitudes. I conduct bottom-up research into the intersection of military culture, masculinity and violence in Italy’s previously unstudied court martial cases. Combining the History of Gender and Emotions, extensive coding protocols and some digital methods, the project examines hundreds of cases of soldiers who either refused to obey the military or who resorted to violence in the pursuit of various ends.