Areas of expertise
Biography
I work as a researcher in the Department of Cultural History specializing in nineteenth-century cultural and intellectual history, press history and the history of learned communities. I have published also on the history of travel writing and on book history, among other topics.
I conducted my MA and PhD studies at the University of Turku, where I studied History, Philosophy and some Political Science as well. I gained my doctoral degree in 2013 in Cultural History at the University of Turku. In my doctoral dissertation, I studied the conceptual dimension of the Finnish nineteenth-century cultural discourse by investigating the entangled meanings of culture, Bildung and civilisation in the writings of Johan Vilhelm Snellman (1806–1881), a Swedish-speaking philosopher, journalist and academic.
During my academic career, I have had an opportunity to work in the field of doctoral training as a co-ordinator of several doctoral programmes. In addition to my academic work, I am active in some scholarly societies. I am especially interested in the fields of science communication, non-fiction writing and the dialogue between arts and sciences.
Teaching
I have worked as a teacher and a supervisor in the interdisciplinary study programme Baltic Sea Region Studies (UTU) for several years. In this programme, I have taught courses on the themes of identity, nationalism, transnationalism and cultural transfer. I have also been involved in various teaching activities at my home department including a MA level seminar in cultural history.
Research
Currently (2024-) I'm occupied with my own project that explores the history of Finnish academic communities from the perspective of failures, death and oblivion. In 2020-2024 I have been leading the project Mobility of Words and Places of Knowledge: Learned Communities in Early Nineteenth-Century Finland (Kone Foundation).
I have had an opportunity to work in several research projects led by Professor Hannu Salmi, first in Travelling Notions of Culture: Itineraries of Bildung and Civilisation in Early Nineteenth-Century Europe and later in Computational History and the Transformation of Public Discourse in Finland, 1640–1910, and in Viral Culture in Early Nineteenth-Century Europe. In these projects, I have studied the spatial dimension of civilisation (for example in Nordic travelogues), text re-use in Finnish newspapers and the viral nature of revolution in early nineteenth-century Europe.
During 2020-2023, I have been active in the research project Information Flows across the Baltic Sea: Swedish-language press as a cultural mediator, 1771-1918 led by Prof. Salmi. In 2023-2024 I have also worked in the research project Fauna et Flora Fennica led by Otto Latva.