Elise Dermineur

ELISE DERMINEUR was a Post-doctoral researcher at the University of Lund and is now the Pro Futura Scientia IX Research Fellow at Uppsala University. She completed her Ph.D thesis - Women in Rural Society: Peasants, Patriarchy and the Local Economy in Northeast France, 1650-1789 - at Purdue University in 2011, and was a Max Weber research fellow at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy in 2011/12. Dermineur is currently transforming her Ph.D into a monograph, and has published a range of articles in journals including the Journal of Social History, Frühneuzeit-Info and Proceedings of the Western Society for French History.

Dermineur has focused on Luise Ulrike’s European network, including her family members and the philosophers and artists associated with them. Luise Ulrike was expected to help the Prussian state influence the Swedish state, and the role(s) which culture (political thought, science, literature, theatre, art, history and other cultural expressions) played in this will be a central part of the project. Luise Ulrike had dynastic connections to many of the German courts and the exchange of both material goods and ideas between family members will be studied through archival records and actual collections. The focus here fell on the reciprocal influences within the network as a basis of considering some of ‘Marrying Cultures’ biggest question: did a consort bring integration (cultural, political, economic or otherwise) to the European regions she was connected with? Did her transnational connections in different parts of Europe influence her new country and did her experiences in Sweden influence her connections? Working with Svante Norrhem, Dermineur’s focus on the interaction between Luise Ulrike’s two networks - Swedish and European - investigated the reciprocal cultural influences and both their long-term and short-term cultural and political results with a view to developing our understanding of the role(s) which consorts could play in culture and politics.