Postdoctoral Researcher position Toxicities in Industrial Greenhouse Agriculture - Meertens

1 Postdoctoral Researcher position on "Toxicities in Industrial Greenhouse Agriculture" within the ERC Starting Grant VITALGREENHOUSE

Apply until: August 15, 2025. 

The Ethnology department at the Meertens Insitute (KNAW) is currently seeking 1 postdoctoral researcher for the project “Greenhouses as Vital Landscapes: Sustainability, Relationality, and the Future of Food” (VITALGREENHOUSE) led by Dr. Rebeca Ibáñez Martín. This project is funded by a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant.

Job description

Briefly, VITALGREENHOUSE project aims to investigate greenhouse industrial agriculture in the Netherlands and Spain, as sites embedded within a long history of human-environment relations, integrating questions of landscape exploitation, digitalization, mobilities, and human and non-human labor. The project seeks to generate new critical perspectives on planetary transformations and advance theoretical debates in critical infrastructure studies, multispecies relations, and decolonial thought.

The postdoctoral researcher will conduct a detailed ethnographic study in greenhouse horticultural landscapes in the Netherlands and Spain. Greenhouses have become a focal point of public concern regarding toxicity, particularly in both countries, where European industrial agriculture is most concentrated. Growing unease centers on the toxic effects of pesticides used in these areas. The public debate is often framed in oppositional terms; on one side, greenhouse growers emphasize their adherence to legal limits for pesticide use based on food safety regulations; on the other, critics highlight ecological and health consequences. These polarized debates reveal deeper tensions between economic interest, food security, and concerns about ecological and public health.

During the twentieth century, dominant toxicological thinking held that “the dose makes the poison,” supporting cost-benefit approaches that assumed risks could be minimized by keeping concentrations below established thresholds. This paradigm is now challenged from within the scientific community. Eco-toxicologists emphasize that the problem lies not only in the individual chemicals but in the combined and cumulative effects of legally permitted low-dose concentrations. Pesticide traces extend far beyond the sprayed crops and greenhouse walls – they have been detected in birds and eggs, household dust, present in breast milk and used diapers, and even on doormats. These mixtures are understood to interfere with the biological functioning of both human and non-human bodies, suggesting that exposure occurs through everyday practices such as breathing, eating, and skin contact with contaminated surfaces or materials.

This work package (WP), lead by the Postodoc, aims to gain insight into how people in everyday work and life settings seek to know, evaluate, and respond to pesticide exposure. It does so by examining and contrasting knowledge practices across diverse institutional and domestic contexts, including:

• Eco-toxicologists working to make the cumulative effects of pesticide mixtures on organisms—human and otherwise—scientifically measurable;
• Workers' unions advocating for a healthy working environment for greenhouse laborers;
• Local residents' groups such as Meten=Weten, who call for stricter regulation and strive to raise public awareness about its presences within the living environment;
• Local public health and environmental authorities tasked with regulating emissions, monitoring exposures, and informing residents about potential health risks associated with touching, inhaling, and ingesting pesticides.

You will be based in Amsterdam (the Netherlands) and will conduct fieldwork in Spain and the Netherlands, to fully compare and contrast the sites and findings. The aim is to gain insight into how people in everyday work and life settings seek to know, evaluate, and respond toxic and pesticide exposure.

Your Tasks

• Conduct ethnographic research on greenhouse toxic exposures, to gain insight into how people in everyday work and life settings seek to know, evaluate, and respond to pesticide exposure. It does so by examining and contrasting knowledge practices across diverse institutional and domestic contexts).
• Participate in a research team consisting of two PhD candidates and the Principal Investigator (PI). Your primary responsibility will be to develop your WP, and assist the PI in developing the project.
• Contribute to collaborative aspects of the project, including data collection for jointly written publications, and network and dissemination events.
• Publish at least 2 co-authored publications.
• Provide supervision support for the PhDs, especially during fieldwork.
• Reside in Amsterdam (or within commuting distance) in order to work on site (not remotely) and attend meetings and other netwrok activities when not on fieldwork and actively participate in team meetings and the research environment at the Institute.

Requirements

The following are essential:

• A doctorate diploma in a relevant field within the social sciences such as Social and Cultural Anthropology, Human Geography or Political Ecology. The degree must be obtained by the time of application;
• Experience with publishing in scientific journals;
• Excellent oral and written communication skills in English;
• Oral communication skills in Dutch and Spanish.
• Excellent communication skills, organizational skills, and collaboration skills;
• Previous demonstrable experience in ethnographic research;
• Independent thinking and strong analytical skills;
• A commitment to academic integrity and transparency;
• Availability to travel to Spain for fieldwork.

The following are desirable:

• Affinity with the field of Science and Technology Studies (STS).
• Commitment to or previous engagement with topics related to agricultural transitions, sustainability, political ecology, and multispecies ethnographies.

Application Requirements

Applications should include the following (all files, except your CV, should be submitted as a single PDF):

• Your Curriculum Vitae (max. 2 pages), including a list of publications.
• A cover letter (max. 2 pages) describing your qualifications and motivation for the position. Please specify the aspects of the project that interest you and explain what has led you to your current intellectual and scholarly focus.
• A link to your PhD dissertation (if available online) or a copy sent via the PDF.
• Contact information for two academic references (no letters of recommendation at this stage, just the contacts).

Shortlisted candidates will be invited for an interview, preferably in person, on the 26 and 27 of August 2025.

What we are offering
We offer a postdoc position of 0.8 FTE for 2 years (24 months). You will be collaborating closely with the PI in the developing and exciting new line of research, financed by the ERC. The Royal Academy offers an attractive career development program, including Dutch lessons, academic writing courses, or grant writing courses.

Application procedure
If this opportunity resonates with you, but you’re unsure if you meet all the requirements, we encourage you to apply. In line with the Institute’s commitment to diversity, we strongly encourage applications from all qualified candidates, particularly those from migration backgrounds or other groups underrepresented in academia. We look forward to receiving your application by August 15 , 2025. The expected starting date is 1st November 2025.  

For more information
For any questions contact dr. Rebeca Ibáñez Martín, Principal Investigator of VITALGREENHOUSE ERC starting grant, rebeca.ibanemartin@meertens.knaw.nl 

About Meertens
The Meertens Institute, together with the International Institute of Social History and the Huygens ING, is part of the KNAW Humanities Cluster. This is a partnership in which research in the humanities (history, ethnology, literature, linguistics) is carried out using advanced methods, in which computer science plays an important role.

The Meertens Institute is a national institute for research and documentation of the Dutch language and culture, and language and culture in the Netherlands. It consists of the research groups Ethnology and Variational Linguistics, both of which hold leading positions in international research on everyday language and culture.

Terms of employment
Depending on education and experience the minimum salary is €4537,00 and the maximum salary is €5013,00 gross per month for a full-time appointment (scale 11, maximum increment 3; cao Nederlandse Universiteiten/KNAW). This is exclusive of 8% vacation allowance, 8.3% year-end bonus, travel allowance, internet allowance, home working allowance and pension accrual with ABP.

The KNAW offers its staff an excellent package of secondary benefits. A package that meets the different needs of employees depending on their stage of life, lifestyle or career ambitions. For example, by working an extra two hours a week, it is possible to increase the number of days off from 29 to 41 days a year (with full-time employment). 

For a complete overview of the terms of employment, please refer to the web page: werken bij de KNAW.

Applying for a Certificate of Good Conduct can be part of the employment procedure.

Diversity & Inclusion
The KNAW considers a working environment in which everyone feels welcome and appreciated of great importance. A working environment in which attention is paid to individual quality and where development opportunities are paramount. Together we strive for an inclusive culture in which we embrace differences. We would therefore like to invite candidates who want to contribute to this through their background and experience. In the event of equal suitability, preference will be given to the candidate who thus enhances diversity within the Academy.

We will not respond to any supplier enquiries based on this job advertisement.