Stadelgasse 8b
39042 Brixen | Bressanone
South Tyrol/Italy

+39 0472 062 900
office@regionalgeschichte.it

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Mag. Dr. Francesca Brunet

Research associate

Raum 4.04 – Stadelgasse 8b
39042 Brixen

Image

Foto: Andreas Tauber

Info

 After completing her undergraduate degree in history at Florence and Venice, Francesca Brunet received her doctorate in 2013 from the Universities of Innsbruck and Trento under the international PhD programme “Politische Kommunikation von der Antike bis ins 20. Jahrhundert / Political Communication from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century” (Universities of Frankfurt am Main, Innsbruck, Trento, Bologna, and Pavia), with a dissertation on the death penalty and pardon measures in Lombardy-Venetia during the Vormärz.

From 2011 to 2019 she worked as a research assistant and postdoctoral fellow at various universities and research institutes in Italy, Austria, Germany, and Switzerland, contributing to a range of projects in the history of law, institutions, and mobility between the early modern period and the early twentieth century, with a strong emphasis on the Austro-Tyrolean, Lombardo-Venetian, and Swiss areas.

From 2019 to 2023 she was a researcher at the Competence Centre for Regional History at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, where she coordinated the Modern Regional History research area; since January 2024 she has been a researcher at the new Centre for Regional History in Brixen.

Since 2026 she has taught at the School of Archival Science, Palaeography, and Diplomatics of the Bolzano State Archive (Scuola di Archivistica, Paleografia e Diplomatica dell’Archivio di Stato di Bolzano).

She holds the Italian National Research Qualification (Abilitazione Scientifica Nazionale) as Associate Professor in History of Political Doctrines and Institutions (2018) and in Early Modern History (2026).

She is affiliated with several historical associations; she serves as vice president of Geschichte und Region / Storia e Regione and of the Società di Studi Trentini di Scienze Storiche, and sits on the editorial boards of their respective journals.

Her research interests centre primarily on the social history of crime and “deviance,” the history of mobility, and the history of criminal law and of judicial institutions.

Curriculum vitae

  • 2026

    Obtained the National Research Qualification (Abilitazione Scientifica Nazionale) as Associate Professor in Modern History

  • Since 2024

    Researcher at the Centre for Regional History, Brixen

  • 2019–2023

    Researcher at the Competence Centre for Regional History, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano

  • 2018–2019

    Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Lucerne under the SNF-Sinergia international project no. CRSII5_177286, titled “Milan and Ticino (1796–1848): Shaping the Spatiality of a European Capital”

  • 2018

    Obtained the National Research Qualification (Abilitazione Scientifica Nazionale) as Associate Professor in History of Political Thought and Institutions

  • 2014–2018

    Research Associate at the Società di Studi Trentini di Scienze Storiche (Trentine Society for Historical Studies) for the research project “Giovanni a Prato (1812–1883): Lettere, discorsi e scritti” (Giovanni a Prato [1812–1883]: Letters, Speeches, and Writings)

  • 2016–2017

    Postdoctoral Fellow at Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main with the research project “Politische Emigration aus der Habsburgermonarchie in die Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika im 19. Jahrhundert: politische, soziale und kulturelle Netzwerke in transnationaler Perspektive” (Political Emigration from the Habsburg Monarchy to the United States of America in the Nineteenth Century: Political, Social, and Cultural Networks from a Transnational Perspective)

  • 2015–2017

    Research Associate at the Fondazione Museo Storico del Trentino for the exhibition project “Dentro: La Trasformazione delle Prigioni di Trento nell’Ottocento” (Inside: The Transformation of Trento’s Prisons in the Nineteenth Century) and the editorial project “Opere Battistiane,” devoted to the work of Cesare Battisti.

  • 2012–2016

    Research Associate at the Fondazione Bruno Kessler – Italian-German Historical Institute, based in Trento, for the archival project “TREWI: Documenti sulla Grande Guerra a Trento e a Vienna” (Documents on the Great War in Trento and Vienna)

  • 2015

    Postdoctoral Fellow at the Historisches Institut beim Österreichischen Kulturforum, in Rome, with the research project “Politische und nationale Spannungen, Generationskonflikte und institutionelle Treue in der Biographie eines Tiroler Richters: Antonio Salvotti zwischen Tirol, Lombardo-Venetien und Wien (1789–1866)” (Political and National Tensions, Generational Conflicts, and Institutional Loyalty in the Biography of a Tyrolean Judge: Antonio Salvotti between Tyrol, Lombardy-Venetia, and Vienna [1789–1866]).

  • 2012–2014

    Research Associate at University of Innsbruck for a research project on the history of the Taxis-Bordogna family and postal communications in the Trentino-Tyrol area.

  • 2013

    PhD in History (joint degree from the Universities of Innsbruck and Trento)

  • 2011–2012

    Research Associate at the Bolzano Provincial Archives for the project “Verwaltungseliten in Tirol/Vorarlberg und Österreich: Umbau der politischen Ordnung mithilfe der Verwaltung, 1780–1835” (Administrative Elites in Tyrol/Vorarlberg and Austria: Reorganizing the Political Order through Administration, 1780–1835)

  • 2008–2012

    Doctoral Fellow in the international PhD programme “Politische Kommunikation von der Antike bis ins 20. Jahrhundert” (Political Communication from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century) and subsequently in the University of Innsbruck’s early-career researcher support program (Doktoratsstipendium aus der Nachwuchsförderung)

  • 2007–2008

    Editorial Assistant at ISSAN (Istituto Studi e Sviluppo Aziende Non Profit / Institute for the Study and Development of Nonprofit Enterprises), at the University of Trento

  • 2007

    MA (Laurea Specialistica) in European History from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice

  • 2004

    BA (Laurea Triennale) in History of Religions from the University of Florence

Affiliations & memberships (selection)

  • Since 2024

    Member of the advisory board of the Claudia Augusta Provincial Library in Bolzano

  • Since 2024

    Member of the Austrian Section of the Istituto per la Storia del Risorgimento Italiano

  • Since 2024

    Member of the Accademia Italiana di Filatelia e Storia Postale (Italian Academy of Philately and Postal History)

  • Since 2022

    Fellow of the Accademia Roveretana degli Agiati

  • Since 2021

    Member of the research lab Ergastulum: Istituzioni, Spazi e Pratiche Carcerarie nell’Italia di Età Moderna e Contemporanea (Prison Institutions, Spaces, and Practices in Modern and Contemporary Italy)

  • 2019–2022; since 2025

    Member of the editorial board of the journal Studi Trentini. Storia

  • Since 2014

    Member of the editorial board of the journal Geschichte und Region / Storia e Regione

  • Since 2014

    Member of the Società di Studi Trentini di Scienze Storiche: Member of the governing board since 2019, Vice President since 2022

  • Since 2014

    Member of the learned society Geschichte und Region / Storia e Regione: Member of the governing board, President from 2020 to 2024, Vice President since 2024

  • Since 2012

    Member of SISCALT: Società Italiana per la Storia Contemporanea dell’Area di Lingua Tedesca (Italian Society for Contemporary History of the German-Speaking Area)

  • Cooperation partner on several international research projects

  • Peer-review activities for journals, publishers, and research funds

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