Lecture, Austrian Studies Fund Lunch Talk

Professor Peter Bisschop, lecturer in Sanskrit and Ancient Cultures of South Asia, has been awarded a grant by the NWO Free Competition to fund his research into the rapid growth of Saivism in the sixth and seventh centuries in South and Southeast Asia. The research project, entitled ‘From Universe…

Papyrology+, founded in 2014, is a collaboration of Leiden scholars studying (Abnormal) Hieratic, Demotic, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Coptic, and Arabic papyri from a socio-historical, economic and linguistic perspective. Papyrology+ aims to explore new opportunities and directions in the study of ancient…

Harriet Hunter defended her thesis on 26 September 2018.

Thanks to its early civilisation and continuous mix of influences, the Muslim world has a rich and varied culture. The study of material culture, books, stories, films and increasingly television series teaches us about the structure of modern-day Muslim societies.

On 5 February 2019, Alain Vannieuwenburg defended his thesis 'Pleidooi voor een lekenrenaissance'. The doctoral research was supervised by Prof. dr. P.B. Cliteur.

LIAS has a School of Asian Studies (SAS), a School of Middle-Eastern Studies (SMES) and a School of Religious Studies (LUCSoR). These designations, and the fields within them, remain foundational to our work. At the same time, the academic community benefits from the presence of cross-regional networks…

ICLON provides several programmes for second and first degree teaching qualifications.

Understanding the history of Islam and Muslim societies sheds a clear light on the complex and changing social structures of the Middle East, including the current trouble spots whose effect spreads all the way to Western Europe.

Before 1936, musical practices in Palestine relied heavily on colloquial poetry, especially in rural communities, which constituted most of the population. In this dissertation, Issa Boulos has examined historical records that revealed many differences and similarities between Palestinian communities…

‘Islam and Muslims are not something that happened to Europe; they are part of Europe. In fact, Islam is one the biggest constants in European history,’ argues Professor Maurits Berger in the new eight-part Matters of Humanities: History of Islam in Europe podcast series of the Leiden University Faculty…

Muslims have lived in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe for centuries. Their arrival in Western Europe, the two Americas and Australia is however relatively recent. Studying how Muslims relate to their Western environment (and vice versa) and the mutual influences of Western and Islamic philosophies…

Mexico, between 500 B.C. and A.D. 900

The Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS) is one of the few research institutes in the world in which researchers in the field of literature, art, architecture, design and media studies come together to conduct research into the cultural production of the western world, from classical…

The |0100| Project studies the discourses, practices and imaginaries of Islamic information society’s most debated component- Artificial Intelligence- using multimodal and mixed methods and comparing and contrasting narratives and imagery of AI-religious-futures in Muslim Southeast Asia.

Your time at Leiden is about more than just studying. Some of your best experiences will stem from being a part of our lively and diverse student community, as well as from life in the beautiful city of Leiden.

From the mid-19th century until the 1970’s, the Middle East witnessed the presence of various European missionaries who played a fundamental role in the birth and the development of humanitarianism. Since these Christian missionaries were well integrated in the local Middle Eastern societies via their…

Sanne Dokter-Mersch defended her thesis on Thursday 15 April 2021.

Wim Klooster and Gert Oostindie present a fresh look at the Dutch Atlantic in the period following the imperial moment of the seventeenth century. This epoch (1680–1815), the authors argue, marked a distinct and significant era in which Dutch military power declined and Dutch colonies began to chart…

An interdisciplinary collection of the best international scholarship on Muslim youth.

Eschatology played a central role in both politics and society throughout the early modern period. It inspired people to strive for social and political change, including sometimes by violent means, and prompted in return strong reactions against their religious activism.

In the Brill series Intersections a new volume has been published, entitled Ronsard and Du Bartas in Early Modern Europe.

Are you a student from Indonesia, planning to study in Leiden?

This open access book investigates the transnationally connected history of Arab Christian communities in Palestine during the British Mandate (1918-1948) through the lens of the birth of cultural diplomacy.

This book explores the intellectual and cultural flows between Asia and Europe which occurred during – and were formative of – the political and social changes of the first half of the twentieth century.

Neil Young and Philosophy, edited by Douglas L. Berger, explores the meanings, importance, and philosophical dimensions of the music, career, and life of this prolific singer/songwriter over the past five decades.

Prince, Pen, and Sword offers a synoptic interpretation of rulers and elites in Eurasia from the fourteenth to the eighteenth century. Four core chapters zoom in on the tensions and connections at court, on the nexus between rulers and religious authority, on the status, function, and self-perceptions…

In African societies today, growing inequality and continued exclusion due to ethnicity, gender, religion, disability or sexual orientation give rise to both contestation and cooperation for social change. How does the written or spoken word lead to collaboration and contestation in areas of social…

Lecture, Research Seminar Medieval and Early Modern History

Viviana Massa defended her thesis on 16 December 2018.

Nirajan Kafle defended his thesis on 15 October 2015

ERC Starting Grant: The Van Manen Project. This five year project (2023-2028) is made possible with an ERC Starting Grant. It aims to (digitally) reunite all parts of the Van Manen Collection. This enables us to study it as a whole, helping us to understand the process of collection formation. More…

Migration imposes special pressures on the meaning, experience and organization of lifecycle rituals. These pressures are felt most strongly by Muslim migrants to Western Europe. In this innovative study, Nathal M. Dessing examines the effects of migration on the life cycle rituals of Moroccan, Turkish…

Our recent excavations have focused on the more recent New Kingdom/Late Period (ca. 1500-332 BCE) material.

More on the Dutch webpage.

University Lecturer Ahab Bdaiwi:

This book is an examination of why and how the elective principle, already established in Transylvanian and Polish political culture in the late medieval period, was transformed in the early elections of the 1570s.

This dissertation provides a detailed description of the interaction between verb semantics and the two grammatical voice categories in the Vedic Sanskrit of the Rigveda.

Kuba funerary art from the Congo River Basin

Do you want to understand the complexities of today’s gender issues, social media use, food habits, social justice movements, labour relations or religious expressions? Join our bachelor's programme in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology and get insight into people's social and cultural…

Jochem van den Boogert defended his thesis on 18 November 2015

A Jurist's Travelogue

Iconografía, epigrafía e historia en los monumentos arqueológicos

The portal for prospective Indonesian Students contains information about the possibilities to study at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

On May 3rd, Varun de Castro Arrazola succesfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Varun on this great result.

Why do historians so often talk about objectivity, empathy, and fair-mindedness? What roles do such personal qualities play in historical studies? And why does it make sense to call them virtues rather than skills or habits?

The project focuses on communication processes regarding spirituality and existential issues in the medical health care in the Netherlands

Islam exists in global history with its richly variegated cultural and social realities. When these specific cultural contexts are marginalized, Islam is reduced to an ahistorical religion without the ability to contribute to humanity. This limited understanding of Islam has been a contributing factor…

Ideology and Christianity in Japan shows the major role played by Christian-related discourse in the formation of early-modern and modern Japanese political ideology.