Part of ‘Moralising Misfortune: A Comparative Anthropology of Commercial Insurance’, an ERC Consolidator project of Erik Bähre.

This project investigates how early print media covered distant but urgent geopolitical conflicts, using newspapers from the Low Countries, north and south.

Natural resources often stretch across borders that separate modern nation states. This can create conflict and limit opportunities for regulated consumption of their goods and services, but also provide opportunities for joint multinational efforts that exceed single country capabilities.

This paper addresses the gap that explores how agencies might allocate their personnel so as to maximise performance with the personnel they have.

Emphasizing on the key role of polysemy in forming the lexicon is the main goal to be achieved in this dissertation paper. The paper suggests a qualitative evaluation of polysemy in comparing it with other relations that form the lexicon. The research confirms that the polysemic links must not be modeled…

Would you like to develop further and be challenged academically in your field or beyond? The Faculty of Humanities offers a wide range of courses to boost your career, learn new skills or broaden your knowledge.

Part of ‘Moralising Misfortune: A Comparative Anthropology of Commercial Insurance’, an ERC Consolidator project of Erik Bähre.

On 30 November, Florian Theissen defended the thesis 'Sincerely believing in freedom: a reconstruction and comparison of the interpretation of the freedom of religion and belief on the Canadian Supreme Court, the South African Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights'. The doctoral…

The history of sign languages of deaf people is severely understudied. The historical linguistics of sign languages offers a fundamentally new perspective on the history of human languages. This project addresses the dearth of knowledge about historical sign language linguistics through a large-scale…

Exploring the Meanings of Lands and Forests as an Avenue for Mutual Development of People and Nature in Ghana

All research at Leiden University is organised into institutes. To do justice to the wide spectrum of research (and consequently teaching) that comes from these, you will find descriptions of all the Leiden institutes on these pages.

Leiden’s Faculty of Humanities is one of the broadest of its kind, offering courses in no fewer than 80 different languages and a very broad spectrum of academic disciplines.

A discount on textbooks is always welcome. But for these students joining a study association has meant much more than that alone.

Communication is the transmission of information. All day long we are busy explaining and making things clear to each other, but exactly how we do that varies from language to language. Associate Professor Jenneke van der Wal delved into African Bantu languages for a Vidi project.

Customisation is high on the political agenda, but how do you make it work? Many public organisations are struggling to find an answer to this question. Which steps are essential to effectively implement made-to-measure solutions within an organisation. The Leiden Leadership Centre (LLC) is organising…

In Dutch daily Trouw, assistent professor Cyber Security Governance, Els de Busser writes about the importance of good digital safety at companies. Dutch telephone and internet provider KPN is lacking in this respect. ' In Trouw schrijft Els de Busser, universitair docent Cyber Security Governance…

Dutch coalition parties VVD and CDA want to tighten asylum policy and have launched a plan to grant two types of statuses to refugees. They also intend to partially restrict the right to family reunification. However, this plan is facing strong opposition. With the proposal, the government can expect…

Hanneke Hulst has held the new Leiden chair in Neuropsychology in Health and Disease since 1 September. From 1 January she will also be chair of the Health, Medical and Neuropsychology (HMN) unit. ‘HMN is my new base. I’m curious to find out about the people who work here, what they do and what motivates…

Until recently the Congo’s isolated Boa community had never read a single letter in their own language: quite simply, there was no alphabet to describe the language. A crowdfunding campaign by guest staff member Gerrit de Wit has changed that. He plans to use the rest of the money to work with a Congolese…

Many Western defence strategies concentrate on maintaining the status quo. Actively promoting universal values can also be a good strategy for resilience, according to Theo Brinkel, Professor by Special Appointment in Military-Social Studies. Inaugural lecture 15 January.

On 29 May Ambassador Lamberto Zannier, OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities, gives a lecture about his mandate and work methods. After the lecture students can ask their questions during the Q&A.

On Thursday 12 June 2013 , Radosław Sikorski, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland, gave the first Europa lecture entitled: 'Poland, the Netherlands and the European Union - Common Challenges'.

Our motto is Praesidium Libertatis, or ‘bastion of liberty’. How did it come into existence, and in what way is Leiden University staying true to its meaning? Five questions about our motto.

The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics has been badly affected by the corona crisis: the research in the four labs and the fieldwork has come to a standstill. What are the implications?

On Wednesday the 23rd of March 2016, Prof. Richard Leakey, the world renowned palaeoanthropologist and conservationist from Kenya and Honorary Member of the LEAD Programme, visited the LEAD Office to contribute to a PhD Workshop.

This year the PhDs of the institute had their traditional day out (uitje) to The Hague. The last two years they had stayed in Leiden, so The Hague already seemed like quite the adventure. Indeed, it seems almost that as time progresses and more and more archives become digitized, history PhDs slowly…

Three young lecturers are to receive a Comenius Teaching Fellow grant of 50,000 euros. The grant will allow each of them to implement an innovation project in their teaching.

How will future technological developments influence our everyday lives? This is the key question during the Brave New World symposium on 2 and 3 November.

Michiel Veldhuis received the most public votes for the C.J. Kok Public Award and may therefore call himself Discoverer of the Year. Veldhuis researches how climate change affects savannah ecosystems in Africa and how we can protect them.

Roel Wouters (24), a biology student at Leiden University, is a finalist in the election for UN youth delegate for Biodiversity and Food. The digital polls open for a week on Friday 22 October. Under-30s can vote for Roel at www.stemroel.nl.

The Faculty of Archaeology proudly presents the research brochure Perspectives on the Past, featuring passionate, dedicated researchers introducing a dazzling scala of research topics: from present-day traditional knowledge in Africa to the power of glue in Palaeolithic Europe. In addition to these…

Professor Geert de Snoo, Dean of the Faculty of Science at Leiden University, has been appointed Director of the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) with effect from 1 November 2019. He will stand down from his role as Dean of the Faculty of Science with effect from 1 September. De Snoo will…

Four researchers from Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science have been awarded a grant to jointly investigate attitudes towards Venezuelan immigrants among youths in Ecuador. Combining their expertise and collaborating with the Universidad San Francisco de Quito, they will focus on school-going…

Population growth, economic expansion and the associated land use caused an increase in the number of bird species facing extinction and a reduction in carbon storage worldwide. These are the findings of an international team of scientists, also from the Leiden University Institute of Environmental…

Nu belastingsystemen over grenzen gaan, speelt de politiek een steeds grotere rol. Irma Mosquera Valderrama pleit voor een wereldwijd, inclusief systeem.

Researchers at Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) and Radboud university medical center have been given the green light to deliberately infect volunteers with malaria in order to test a highly promising vaccine on them.

Are you passionate about building a better world? Do you want to connect with the young world leaders of today and tomorrow? If so, apply for the One Young World Summit in The Hague, to be held from 17 to 20 October 2018! Leiden University is sponsoring two tickets. Mayor of The Hague, Pauline Krikke,…

Until now, systematic discussions of gender, race and law have received little attention from Dutch law faculties, especially at the undergraduate teaching level. At the same time, public calls for discussion of these issues increases rapidly.

Spitting cobra venom composition has been influenced by defensive behaviour according to an international research team. This may have originated from the arrival of human ancestors. Students at the Institute of Biology Leiden made an important contribution to the study. Publication in Science on 22…

At the opening of the LDE-BRIN Academy on 31 October, the Bosscha Medal was awarded to Professor Taniawati Supali from the Department of Parasitology at the University of Indonesia. She receives the medal for her outstanding contribution to science and her working style, which is characterised by collaboration,…

How can KLM remain the most sustainable airline? Master’s students from the Leiden Leadership Programme immerse themselves in practice and advise companies on major issues.

The dental remains of 25 enslaved Africans from the site of Newton's Plantation, on Barbados, were subjected to isotope analysis. Previous research had pointed out that the locally born individuals were subjected to high concentrations of lead poisoning. A new study, done by Dr Jason Laffoon among others…

Prof. Dr Isabella Diederiks-Verschoor passed away on 17 October 2017 at the age of 102. She was a pioneer of air and space law, both in the Netherlands and all over the world.

Researchers from Leiden University, McMaster University and Public Health Ontario are calling on colleagues to track down archival specimens of mosquitoes from museums and other collections and to examine them with modern methods. This will tell them more about malaria transmission.

On January 5, Rosa Winter will obtain her doctorate in arithmetic geometry. She researched solutions of equations that define so-called ‘del Pezzo surfaces’. ‘I like geometry because I can imagine and draw the shapes and objects,’ says Winter. ‘That makes abstract mathematics feel more tangible.’

Political scientist Wouter Veenendaal received an NWO Veni grant for his research on the political stability of small states. 'I find small states fascinating, they are almost always excluded from comparative research, while in fact they often challenge existing theories in political science.'

Leiden Biology student Lukas Kiefer has won the Unilever Research Prize 2018 for his research into efficient production of a new antibiotic. Kiefer: ‘I want to make biological medicines available to people in need.'

North Korean labourers are still being forced to work in the European Union. According to researchers, including Professor of Korean Studies Remco Breuker at Leiden University, Dutch companies are buying ships from a dockyard that uses North Korean workers.