Politics, Culture and National Identities investigates a wide range of national political cultures in Europe and the Americas in the 19th and 20th centuries.

A measured yet theoretically innovative exploration of how Islamophobia and radicalisation intersect and reinforce each other.

LUCIS promotes high-quality research on Islam and Muslim societies and actively communicates the insights and findings of that research to the larger public.

Research Schools aim at collaboration between researchers from different faculties (interfaculty schools) and universities (interuniversity schools).

Situated on the west coast of modern Turkey, the site of Ephesus is one of the largest excavations in Turkey and one of the most visited tourist attractions. Only one tenth of the city has been exposed until now although the Austrian Archaeological Institute in Vienna (ÖAI) has been excavating here…

LUCIS affiliated members are researchers outside Leiden University who are actively involved in the study of Islam and/or Muslim societies and who regularly participate in LUCIS activities. LUCIS affiliate membership offers possibilities to cooperate with LUCIS as well as network opportunities. Contact…

Knowledge of Muslim societies is essential to function in a globalised world and to fully understand our own Dutch society. Leiden researchers explore the languages, cultures, religions, legal systems and history of Muslim societies and in this way contribute to a centuries-old tradition.

At LUCIS we offer a varied programme of scholarly meetings (conferences, workshops) which reflect our multidisciplinary and comparative view on Islam and Muslim societies in past and present.

Archiving Medieval and Post-Medieval Archaeological Fieldwork Data from the Eastern Mediterranean (600-2000)

The Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs of Leiden University in The Hague has developed two Serious Games, 'het Grote Migratiespel' and 'het Schipholspel' to introduce secondary school students to their study and research programmes.

No criticism is allowed in Turkey of the mass murder of Armenians that took place a century ago. PhD candidate Alaettin Carikci examined how contemporary artists, authors, film directors and museums have nonetheless found indirect ways of expressing their criticism.

We live in a world of things and people in the past must have been as closely entangled with their material surroundings as we are now. In the Laboratory for Artefact Studies Van Gijn takes a close look at the biographies of objects: what kind of raw material an object is made off and what is its provenience,…

From the Big Bang to superconductivity. Many ground-breaking discoveries have been made in Leiden University’s long history.

Despite not focusing on a particular theme, the academic contributions in this book include essays of history and literature ranging from the Middle Ages to 1970s, from Europe and America to the Ottoman Empire and Turkey.

This dissertation attempts to describe the linguistic history of Hittite on the basis of a systematic etymological treatment of its entire inherited lexicon, precisely analyzing the phonological and morphological developments.

The Issues beneath the Surface

Turkic nomadic rulers established large empires in the Middle East and Asia between the 11th and 14th centuries. This project will explore the link between their political ideology and the production of art and literature, via the cultural heritage of five cities along the Silk Road: Kashgar, Samarkand,…

Political Islam is not new to the Middle East, but the appearance of ISIS has stretched the phenomenon to the extreme.

Research in the History and International Studies 1900-present specialisation addresses the interconnectedness and interdependence of contemporary global political, economic and cultural developments from a multidisciplinary perspective which is rooted in the humanities.

The Law and Digital Technology programme of Leiden University prepares you for a variety of successful careers in an ever-advancing global field.

At his farewell party on 25 August 2018, Erik-Jan Zürcher, professor and specialist on Turkey, was appointed Knight in the Order of the Dutch Lion. He was presented with the award by Leiden's Deputy Mayor Martine Leewis.

Over a decade ago the then foreign minister Abdullah Gül awarded me the “Medal of High Distinction” of the Republic of Turkey. I received the award, consisting of a diploma and a gigantic gold medal, during a festive ceremony at the Turkish embassy in The Hague. The reason I was deemed worthy of the…

Three NGOs are suing the Dutch state for actively contributing to the suffering of refugees on Greek islands. In Dutch newspaper ‘Trouw’, the organisations say that the suffering was caused by the Netherlands agreeing to the EU-Turkey deal.

On 29 November Mariana Gkliati published an opinion piece in the Greek newspaper EFSYN, on the reorganisation of the greek asylum committees.

Every year, in the last month of the Islamic calendar, millions of Muslims from around the world come together in Mecca to perform the Hajj, the pilgrimage that all capable Muslims should perform at least once in their lives. In 2013, the National Museum of Ethnology in Leiden organised the exhibition…

Hybrid zones occur where two species meet and produce offspring (hybrids). Typically, hybrids show a considerable reduction in fitness. In this thesis two hybrid zones are treated.

The main research objective is to map the cities of Roman Asia Minor in terms of location, size, urban amenities and juridical status, with the specific aim to understand the reasons how this urban settlement pattern arose.

The new Middle Eastern Library (MEL) will bring together the UBL's own Middle Eastern collections and the collections of the library of The Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO), which has been part of the Leiden University Libraries since 1st January 2018.

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…

The emergence of new players on the world market such as India, Brazil, China, Turkey and the Gulf States gives Africans more choice in who they work with and under which terms. At the same time, African multinationals are choosing to work with regional partners and are thus furnishing old political…

International partnerships in which Leiden University participates.

The current migration flow into Europa demands effective measures. Leiden experts examine whether these measures are legal and hold up a mirror to policy-makers.

This research project is supported by an NWO Aspasia grant, DeepDish TV, crowd-sourced funding, and the Democracy and Media Foundation.

The Leiden University Institute for Area Studies (LIAS) is devoted to the study of places in the human world from antiquity to the present time in a comparative and interdisciplinary perspective.

The Trojan War plays an important role in Greek mythology. But there is much more to Troy than mythology. The exhibition ‘Troy. City. Homer. Turkey’ can be viewed from 7 December to 5 May 2013. Leiden linguist Alwin Kloekhorst wrote an article for the exhibition catalogue on the language of Troy.

Andrea Cortellari, a 2020 graduate of the MA program in Middle Eastern Studies at the Leiden Institute for Area Studies, wins the best MA thesis prize by the Society for Turkic, Ottoman, and Turkish Studies.

Leiden Public Administration alumnus Jeffrey Jonkers negotiates in Syria with the Assad government, civilians and even with IS. The UN peace talks are due to start shortly in Geneva. Jonkers negotiates behind the scenes.

Countries that import plastic waste recycle an average of at least 63 percent of it. This is surprising, as we previously believed that the vast majority was incinerated or ended up as litter. This was discovered by PhD candidate Kai Li and his colleagues from the Institute of Environmental Sciences in…

Lecture, LUCIS What's New?! Series

Away from the public eye, the court case in Turkey against the Dutch jihadist Reda N. came to a close this week. The verdict has far reaching implications for the case against Reda scheduled to appear in front of a Dutch court next week. Edwin Bakker, Professor Terrorism and Counterterrorism at the…

On 17 March 2022, Ilke Göçmen from Ankara University organised a Conference within the framework of a Jean Monnet Chair on ‘Legal Issues in Turkey – European Union Relations’.

Onze samenwerkingsovereenkomsten bieden zowel studenten als medewerkers de kans om een periode in het buitenland te verblijven en zo hun horizon te verbreden. Ook fungeren de overeenkomsten regelmatig als basis voor onderzoeksprojecten of andere samenwerkingsvormen.

On 8-9 October 2020, ACES and the T.M.C. Asser Instituut organised an interdisciplinary online conference ‘Migration deals and their damaging effects’ on the implications of the increasing use of informal (non-binding) instruments in the field of migration.

Peter Rodrigues, Professor Emeritus of Immigration and board member of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights, recently dealt with a fascinating case in which a woman with Russian nationality felt she had suffered discrimination.

Linguists Alwin Kloekhorst and Alexander Lubotsky from Leiden University made a great discovery this summer. They deciphered a few dozen inscriptions on pot shards found in Daskyleion (North-West Turkey) as Phrygian and Lydian, and thus proved the presence of the Phrygians and Lydians in that area.

Leiden researcher Dr Ben Zonneveld has determined the size of the genome - the amount of DNA per nucleus - of wild tulips. His conclusion is that there are more than 87 wild species. Various possibly new species have been discovered.

Recently, Dr Gül Aktürk Hauser took up the position as Assistant Professor at the department of Heritage and Society. Originally an architect, she got caught up in the study of historical vernacular buildings in northeastern Turkey. Now her focus lies on the impact of climate change on cultural heri…

All students receiving their bachelor diploma in Political Science last week had a reason or two to celebrate. Two of them especially so: they won the annual award for the best thesis in the International Relations and Organisations and the Politicologie/Internationale Politiek programmes. Congratulations,…