Jan Kok | Radboud University Nijmegen (original) (raw)

Papers by Jan Kok

All rights reserved. Except in those cases expressly determined by law, no part of this publicati... more All rights reserved. Except in those cases expressly determined by law, no part of this publication may be multiplied, saved in an automated datafile or made public in any way whatsoever without the express prior written consent of the author Alle rechten voorbehouden. Behoudens de uitdrukkelijk bij wet bepaalde uitzonderingen mag niets van deze uitgave worden verveelvoudigd, opgeslagen in een geautomatiseerd gegevensbestand of openbaar gemaakt, door middel van druk, fotokopie, microfilm, of op welke andere wijze ook, zonder voorafgaande schriftelijke toestemming van de uitgever

TSEG/ Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History, 2020

Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis/ The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History, 2009

De ruimtelijke spreiding van broers en zussen over stad en land van Noord-Holland, 1850-1940 * Sw... more De ruimtelijke spreiding van broers en zussen over stad en land van Noord-Holland, 1850-1940 * Swarming out or sticking together? The dispersal of siblings in the North-Holland countryside, 1850-1940 Why were some families scattered over a larger area than others? In this article we use a dataset with the complete life courses of all siblings originating from 210 families, whose parents married in the same village in the commercialized Northwestern part of the Netherlands in order to discover the determinants of sibling dispersal. Using multinomial logistic regression, we found that the survival status of the parents, the civil status of the siblings and the size and gender composition of the sibling set were the most important factors behind dispersal patterns.

»Kirchenzugehörigkeit und Lebensverlaufsmustertransition in den Niederlanden 1850-1970«. The Neth... more »Kirchenzugehörigkeit und Lebensverlaufsmustertransition in den Niederlanden 1850-1970«. The Netherlands, with dozens of different religious denominations, offer a fine laboratory to study religious differentials in demographic behavior. In this article, I analyze a large historical database with more than 30.000 reconstructed life courses, to answer the question whether statistically significant and consistent behavioral differences across life course domains existed between members of different churches. For each domain-marriage, co-residence, fertility and mortality-the question will be whether the specific ideology of the denominations accounts for the differences or whether the social milieu or life style of the members of these denomination are more important, even after controlling for socioeconomic status. By charting demographic differentials across the life course, it becomes possible to detect whether different churches had specific "life scripts" or ideal scenarios according to which their members should live their lives.

Continuity and Change, 2021

Several studies assume that Calvinist Christianity severely undermined or even persecuted the pra... more Several studies assume that Calvinist Christianity severely undermined or even persecuted the practice of polyandry in the Sri Lankan areas under Dutch control. We analyze Dutch colonial policy and Church activities toward polyandry by combining ecclesiastical and legal sources. Moreover, we use the Dutch colonial administration of the Sinhalese population to estimate the prevalence of polyandry. We conclude that polyandry was far from extinct by the end of the Dutch period and we argue that the colonial government was simply not knowledgeable, interested and effective enough to persecute the practice in the rural areas under its control.

Historical Life Course Studies, 2021

This collection of essays pays tribute to Kees Mandemaker's great contribution to the data in... more This collection of essays pays tribute to Kees Mandemaker's great contribution to the data infrastructure of social science history, in the Netherlands and elsewhere. Several essays discuss (the future of) historical databases. Yet other provide examples of research on topics covering important life course transitions. All demonstrate the scale, scope and variation of research based on well-constructed databases.

Parkstraat 45 bus 3601 B-3000 Leuven All rights reserved. Except in those cases expressly determi... more Parkstraat 45 bus 3601 B-3000 Leuven All rights reserved. Except in those cases expressly determined by law, no part of this publication may be multiplied, saved in an automated datafile or made public in any way whatsoever without the express prior written consent of the authors.

Historical Social Research, 2014

Marrying too old, too young, or not at all could elicit scorn from all sides: family, friends and... more Marrying too old, too young, or not at all could elicit scorn from all sides: family, friends and neighbours. The same could occur when a partner was much younger or older. During modernization new societal norms on marriage are supposed to have emerged and to have become more pervasive, as individual access to and timing of marriage became less dependent on family fortunes and family strategies. In this article, life courses of more than 15,000 Dutch individuals are studied in order to answer the question: was their timing of marriage and choice of partner related to (changing) life scripts-and what social or cultural groups were the carriers of these scripts-or still predominantly determined by family dynamics?

Large historical databases, although intended to last for a long time, can become obsolete for a ... more Large historical databases, although intended to last for a long time, can become obsolete for a variety of reasons. In this essay these reasons are explored and used for a 'health check' of the Historical Sample of the Netherlands (HSN). The HSN leaders are examined for their visionary qualities and their sense of ownership, and the database for its complementarity, versatility and consistency. The essay concludes that, despite challenges ahead, HSN is sound of mind and body.

This volume aims to provide inspiration for the future of historical demography. Prominent schola... more This volume aims to provide inspiration for the future of historical demography. Prominent scholars were invited to reflect critically on where the discipline of historical demography stands now, to reproach us for what we have missed, to indicate key trends in research we must engage with, and to stimulate us to link our future work to other disciplines. Authors were asked to write a provocative pamphlet for the future and to think outside the normal academic boxes. Here the authors present 60 provoking ideas.

Australian Economic History Review, 2020

During their occupation of Sri Lanka (1640-1796) and following Sinhalese and Portuguese practices... more During their occupation of Sri Lanka (1640-1796) and following Sinhalese and Portuguese practices, the Dutch created an elaborate registration of people, estates, and labour services. The administrative records known as the thombos are incomparable in their level of detail, yet they have hardly been used for the purposes of demographic or economic history. This article describes the challenges involved in 'decoding' the thombos, that is, reconstructing the meaning of particular variables in the light of the prevailing legal pluralism in which Sinhalese common law and Roman-Dutch law co-existed uncomfortably. It also summarises research findings from a pilot study involving about two hundred small villages in Colombo province. Finally, it sketches research horizons, as the thombo 'treasure' holds great prospects for (comparative) studies into family systems and the impact of colonial rule on fertility and mortality.

Continuity and Change, 2005

This contribution investigates how religion retarded the Dutch fertility transition by looking at... more This contribution investigates how religion retarded the Dutch fertility transition by looking at how denominations were associated with the timing of first births (starting), the length of birth intervals (spacing), and the timing of last births (stopping). First, we apply a simple descriptive model of starting, spacing, and stopping to life-course data from the province of Utrecht. Then, we apply multivariate regression to assess the independent effects of religious denominations, net of socio-economic status, on stopping behaviour. The results indicate that liberal Protestants were more prone to adopt stopping behaviour than orthodox Protestants and Catholics.

This chapter links recent Dutch and Belgian research in historical demography to on-going debates... more This chapter links recent Dutch and Belgian research in historical demography to on-going debates and emerging trends in the fi eld at large. It starts with the perennial – but always fascinating – discussion on how to make sense of the demographic transition, an extremely complex subject. The discussion is currently moving to the wild fl uctuations in fertility in the twentieth century, as well as to other changes known as the ‘Second Demographic Transition’. Following this, I discuss how historical demographers are making sense of the huge individual variations they uncover in demographic behaviour – including family composition, religion, social class and locality. One strategy is to compare and thus control for context in comparative research designs. Another is to try to locate ‘universal’ elements in demographic behaviour, such as transmitted physiological components. Finally, I show how the concept of long-term traditional, macro-regional family systems is being put to use in...

Research Data Journal for the Humanities and Social Sciences

In this article, the authors describe and explore the dataset Pupils of the Amsterdam Maritime In... more In this article, the authors describe and explore the dataset Pupils of the Amsterdam Maritime Institute 1792–1943, which is based on the Comportementboeken of the Amsterdam Maritime Institute. These records contain biographical information and bodily measurements of aspirant sailors between 12 and 20 years of age. The authors have linked the records (N = 5439) to enrolment records and the examinations for the military draft, which provides unique data on historical adolescent growth rates. Apart from anthropometric research, the dataset can be used for different kinds of studies into the background and early careers of Dutch sailors.

Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis/ The Low Countries Journal of Social and Economic History

Van geboortebank tot collaboratory Een reflectie op twintig jaar dataverzameling en onderzoek met... more Van geboortebank tot collaboratory Een reflectie op twintig jaar dataverzameling en onderzoek met de hsn From a database of births to a collaboratory. A reflection on twenty years of data collection and research with the hsn dataset In 1989 the initiative of the Historical Sample of the Netherlands (hsn) was presented to the scientific community. We discuss the development of the database and we go into the question what kind of research the founders of the hsn had in mind and to what extent this has been realized the last twenty years. While doing this, we realize that the hsn does not operate in a vacuum but stands in the centre of the scientific development. In this article we evaluate the 200 publications based on hsn-material which have appeared till now. We will discuss how new roads have been taken, especially in the fields of life course studies and studies of the family.