Louise Earnshaw

Profile

I graduated from the University of Oxford in 2020 with a BA in History. I remained at Oxford for my Master’s degree, completing an MSt in Modern European History (1850-Present), where my dissertation, ‘Writing War: Experiences of German Nurses in the First World War,’ was awarded a distinction. My Master’s degree was funded by the Henrietta Jex-Blake Scholarship.

I joined the University of Leeds as a PhD candidate in 2021, generously funded by the Joseph Wright Scholarship for German Studies. My doctoral research examines gendered forms of violence in Austria during and after the First World War, with a particular focus on captivity, hunger, and their emotional and social legacies. In 2022, I was an Incoming Junior Research Fellow on the Elisabeth-List Fellowship project ‘War, Welfare, and Gender Politics in the First World War in Local and Global Dimensions’ at the University of Graz.

Research interests

My research interests lie at the intersection of gender history, the history of emotions, and studies of violence and care in modern Europe, with a particular focus on the First World War and its aftermath. My work examines captivity and hunger as underexplored, gendered forms of violence, and considers how these experiences were lived, narrated, and politicised in the post-war period. I am especially interested in the emotional and social legacies of war, including processes of reintegration, welfare provision, and informal care, and in the ways individuals negotiated vulnerability, masculinity, and dependency in moments of crisis.

Methodologically, my research is grounded in the close reading of life-writing sources such as diaries, memoirs, and letters, which I use to explore how violence and care were articulated in everyday terms. More broadly, my interests include post-war reconstruction, prisoners of war, disability and disease, welfare states, veterans’ organisations, and the relationship between violence and care in post-conflict societies, particularly in Central Europe.

Alongside my main research interests, I am also engaged in research culture and the development of inclusive, creative, and collaborative research practices. In 2023-2024, I worked as Project Co-Ordinator on Dr Corinne Painter’s Ways of Knowing: Developing Research Cultures of Resistance, an Enhancing Research Culture-funded project that brought together researchers and creative practitioners to build a community of enquiry around gender, crime, and protest across different national contexts. A key focus of this project was the use of creative practice to enable interdisciplinary inquiry and collaboration. Find out more about the project here.

I have adopted the use of creative practice in my own wider research activities. In 2024 I was the lead organiser of the Empathising with the Enemy Postgraduate Workshop, which was generously funded by the International Society for First World War Studies. Alongside traditional academic dissemination, this workshop employed theatre-based methods in collaboration with a professional theatre practitioner to encourage critical reflection on emotion, perspective, and ethical engagement with historical actors.

My commitment to research culture was recognised through the Leeds University Union Partnership Awards, where I was named AHC Postgraduate Researcher of the Year (2024) and was one of three shortlisted candidates for the university-wide award.

I have presented my research at a range of conferences and research seminars, including those organised by the German History Society, the Association for German Studies, and the Österreichische Zeitgeschichtetag, and I serve as Postgraduate Representative for Women+ in German Studies (role share with Lara-Marie Hägerling), where I support postgraduate researchers, contribute to community-building initiatives, and advocate for gender equity and inclusive research cultures within the field.

Research Interests

• Gender and the First World War
• Gendered Histories of Violence and Vulnerability
• Post-War Veteran Identities and Re-integration
• German and Austrian History
• Welfare states, social policy, and veterans’ provision
• Life-writing as a historical source
• Histories of emotions

Professional Associations

• Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
• German History Society
• International Society for First World War Studies
• Military Welfare History Network
• Royal Historical Society
• Women+ in German Studies

Qualifications

• MSt in Modern European History (1850-Present)
• BA (Hons) in History