Our associate professor Soile Ylivuori was awarded a five-year grant for her ELBOW research project a year ago, and the project is on the progress. Since the first of September, two new members joined the team, and now there is a five-member team working on the history of electricity, medicine, knowledge and experience.

Here, you can get to know the ELBOW project and its members.

What does ELBOW mean?

ELBOW comes from the words Medical Electricity, Embodied Experiences, and Knowledge Construction and the letters in these words. These are the key words that guide our research project.

So, the project explores the way people interacted with electricity in the context of medicine, how they experienced electricity through their bodies, and how they understood and produced knowledge on electricity based on their experiences. The time and place for this exploration is Europe and the Atlantic World during c.1740–1840.

What does ELBOW research project do?

ELBOW uses medical electricity as a window into examining not simply how scientific knowledge was constructed in the long eighteenth century—but more specifically, into the role of embodied experience in this process.

Who belongs to the ELBOW research team?

The ELBOW research team. Project leader Soile Ylivuori (left), doctoral researcher Edna Huotari, postdoctoral researcher Annika Raapke, university researcher Stefan Schröder, and research coordinator Lotta Vuorio

Associate professor Soile Ylivuori is the project leader of the ELBOW research project. By her side, there are three researchers working on the history of electricity, medicine, knowledge and experience – postdoctoral researcher Annika Raapke, university researcher Stefan Schröder, and doctoral researcher Edna Huotari. With the whole research team, various point of views on the subject and different times will be covered. Besides the researchers, research coordinator Lotta Vuorio belongs to the ELBOW research team.

Who supports the project financially?

The project is funded by the European Union, European Research Council (ERC) for years 2022–2027. The ERC Starting Grant is a grant scheme of the European Research Council targeted at promising research directors in the early stages of their careers, as is introduced here.

Where one can follow the project?

You can follow how the project evolves through social media (Facebook and Instagram) and the ELBOW website and blog.

Read more about the project in the following news article written by University of Helsinki: https://www.helsinki.fi/fi/uutiset/kulttuuri/tieteellisen-tiedon-rakentumisen-tutkimiseen-viisivuotinen-erc-rahoitus