Hélder Carvalhal

I am a Portuguese researcher interested in economic and social history. I also enjoy teaching. My research focuses on global living standards, gender, and work and occupational structures since 1500. My work aims to tackle a number of issues from a historical perspective, such as the rise and maintenance of inequalities, as well as the evolution of the wellbeing of populations. I am currently working on the project Gender and Work, with a focus on Southern Europe.

I received my PhD in History from the universities of Évora and Lisbon in 2022 (PIUDHist), with a thesis dedicated to the cooperation and conflict of 16th-century Portuguese royal second sons in the governance of Portugal and its maritime empire. Before 2022, I worked as a research assistant and/or associated researcher in five research projects related with economic and social history headed by organisations in Amsterdam (NL), Lisbon/Évora (PT), and Wageningen (NL): 1) Global Collaboratory on the History of Labour Relations, 1500-2000; 2) Population, Labour and Wealth: a databank for the Economic and Social History of Early Modern Portugal; 3) Local and European Wages in the Portuguese Indian Ocean, 1500-1650: new sources and analytical tools; 4) Indigenous colonial archives: micro-histories and comparisons (INDICO); 5) Rebellion and Resistance in the Iberian Empires, 16th-19th centuries (RESISTANCE).

After the award of my PhD, I accepted a 2-year postdoctoral research fellow position in the ESRC-funded project 'Measuring the Great Divergence: a study in global living standards, 1500-1950', located at the University of Manchester (UK). In Manchester I also lectured at both graduate and undergraduate level, and supervised two Msc dissertations.

Since March 2024, I am co-editor of Continuity and Change (CUP), a journal of social structure, law and demography in past societies. I arrived at Uppsala in August 2014, where I am part of the project Gender and Work.