Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication
Paul van de Laar holds a chair in cities as a portal of globalization and urban history and is head of the History department, Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication. Between 2013 and 2020 he was general and artistic director of Museum Rotterdam, the city museum of Rotterdam, and developed great expertise in the heritage of diversity. His research focuses on comparative port city history and migration history. He is one of the principal investigators associated with the HERA Joint Research Programme: ‘Public Spaces: Culture and Integration in Europe’. PLEASURESCAPES. Port Cities’ Transnational Forces of Integration (Barcelona, Gothenburg, Hamburg, and Rotterdam) (2019-2021). Together with Peter Scholten (EUR) he currently prepares a professional publication on Rotterdam superdiversity, working title: The real Rotterdammer comes from the outside.
Last publications:
(with Arie van der Schoor), ‘Rotterdam’s Superdiversity from a Historical Perspective (1600–1980)’, in: ibid., 21-57
(with met Maurice Crul en Peter Scholten) ‘Conclusions: Coming to Terms with Superdiversity?’, in: ibid., 225-237.
(with Lars de Jagher) ‘The sky is the limit. The Skyline exhibition’, in: Jelena Savíc (eds.), The Future of Museums and Cities, (CAMOC 2019), 76-87, ISBN: 978-92-9012-471-9.
‘The Separation of Ports from Cities: The Case of Rotterdam’ (with Carola Hein),in: Angela Carpenter and Rodrigo Lozano (eds.) European Port Cities. Moving Towards More Sustainable Sea Transport Hubs (Springer 2020) ISBN: 978-3-030-36463-2; DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-36464-9
‘Waterfronts in global perspectives‘, review article, Journal of Urban History (2020) 1-9 DOI: 10.1177/0096144220904044
