Norma Owens is a PhD researcher in History at the University of Galway. She holds an MA in History from the University of Galway, a BA (Photography) from Technological University Dublin (formerly Dublin Institute of Technology) and a Bachelors Degree in Education from the University of Limerick.
Owens’ research interests include early modern women’s history and social history, focussing on female labour in textile industries in the long 18th century. She developed proficiency in network analysis to maximise the research potential of scant archival sources characteristic of marginalised groups and to examine knowledge diffusion. Her current research examines Irish lacemaking networks with continental Europe (c.1730-c.1845).
In 2024, Owens won the MacCurtain/Cullen Essay Prize in Irishwomen’s History from the Women’s History Association of Ireland and was awarded the Galway Doctoral Research Scholarship from the Centre for the Investigation of Transnational Encounters (CITE) at the University of Galway.