Professor Dr. Norman Aselmeyer

Biography

Norman Aselmeyer is a historian specializing in European colonialism in modern Africa, with a particular focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. His research engages urban social history, the history of infrastructure, and the dynamics of popular protest. He completed his doctorate at the European University Institute in Florence in 2022, with a dissertation entitled "Shadow Line: Railway Society and Colonial East Africa, c. 1890–1914." In Oxford, he teaches modern European, African, and global history from around 1800, and offers classes on the Approaches and Disciplines of History. He welcomes supervision requests in modern African colonial history. His research interests include German and British colonialism, modern Africa, decolonization, and the history of the Maasai. He also focuses on global urban history and the legacies and memories of colonialism, exploring how infrastructures like railways shaped the everyday life of empire and how people navigated systems of domination. Aselmeyer's research opens broader questions regarding the memory and reckoning of colonialism within societies, particularly examining the case of divided Germany and its positioning on colonialism and anti-colonial struggles.

Research Interests

Courses