No procession of professors, just a handful of people in the church and snowdrifts outside Leiden’s Pieterskerk: 8 February 2021 was no ordinary Dies Natalis. Carel Stolker transferred the rectorate to Hester Bijl, and Annetje Ottow became the new President of the Executive Board. With an honorary doctorate…

In the Pioneers of Leiden University series we talk to past and present students who were the first in their family to go to university. In this fourth instalment: alumnus and philosopher of law Ali Kösedag (1992): ‘Philosophising about equality before the law in the Netherlands at an early-morning…

Police killed Eric Garner 9 years ago (‘I can’t breathe’) when he resisted a search. Now everyone will consent to stops and searches. Law Professor and author Josephine Ross looks to feminism: what police call consent, feminists would call submission. During the lecture on Wednesday 31 May, Josephine…

You might be wondering what the reconstruction of the former V&D store at Spui in The Hague looks like now. If so, you can come and find out for yourself. On Saturday 8 June 2024, from 10.00 – 13.00 hrs., the building site of the new Campus The Hague Leiden University Building will be open to the pu…

Education

Eva Lammers is currently studying for a master's degree in labour law at Leiden University and expects to graduate in autumn 2023. Lammers did her internship at law firm JPR in Deventer and was thrown in at the deep end from the start. 'Assignments aren’t arranged for you, you've got to arrange them…

Joachim Koops, Professor of Security Studies and Scientific Director of Leiden University’s Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA) has been awarded a ‘Jean Monnet Chair’ with a focus on ‘The European Union’s Role in Security and Global Affairs’ (EURISGA).

Lecture, Leiden Yemeni Studies Lecture Series

Nearly all students have faced many challenges this academic year. Students Nasreen Javanjoo (Religious Studies) and Marcos Cordova (Literary Studies) talk about their experiences of studying in the time of coronavirus.

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…

Education, Organisation

Conference

Not many students can say they launched a business that has multiple employees while studying for their bachelor’s degree. But Timothy Metz can. He’s almost finished his bachelor’s in Tax Law and Law and has already established LawDisk, a Legal Tech startup.

Governance of the internet is chaotic, says Professor Jan Aart Scholte. Can we learn from this relatively new form of governance?

Global science research serves the needs of the Global North, and is driven by the values and interests of a small number of companies, governments and funding bodies, finds a major new international study published today. As such, the authors find, science, technology and innovation research is not…

During the New Year's Reception at FSW, new Dean Sarah de Rijcke gave her maiden speech. The first official moment at which she's able to share what she stands for and what to expect of her. In case you weren't there, or you want to read the speech at your own pace, below you can find the integral copy…

For the eleventh time in a row, Leiden University’s unique liberal arts and sciences programme has been awarded the ‘Top Rated Programme’ quality seal by Keuzegids universiteiten 2024.

Workshop

In brain diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, proteins clump together to form fibres. ‘Chaperone proteins’ unravel those fibres, but in the test tube biochemist Anne Wentink saw that this can also cause new problems. She is going to find out what happens inside cells to determine what a drug…

Abeer Abazeed, PhD-student at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs, will defend her thesis on Wednesday april 21st. Four questions about her PhD-research ‘Is it One Nile? Civic engagement and hydropolitics in the Eastern Nile Basin’.

The BA Religious Studies programme has been awarded the label 'Topopleiding' (Top Education) in the Keuzegids 2021.

IAt the Criminal Justice Public Lecture on 20 April, Professor of Law and Society Maartje van der Woude spoke about her research into decisions and practice in relation to intra-Schengen border areas and the free movement of persons. The thinking behind the Schengen area is that where the external borders…

Not everyone benefits from the increased flexibility in the labour market. EU migrant workers engaged at the lower end of the employment spectrum are falling behind. According to Daniel Carter, the legal system is at fault and in his PhD thesis he explains the reasons why.

Research

‘Culture change takes time,’ said Vice-Rector Hester Bijl at the closing panel of the University’s Diversity Symposium on 26 January. She talked about the road to a diverse and inclusive university. The symposium provided plenty of concrete examples of small steps that can already be taken.

For the first time, a group of international and interdisciplinary researchers led by Karline Janmaat and her former MSc Student Chirag Chittar, have tested the several hypotheses on music simultaneously in a modern foraging society during their daily search for tubers – their staple food.

With her background in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, Leonie Siepmans brings a unique perspective to the corporate world. Find out what an anthropologist does in a big company.

Immediately connect with the needs of industry with your master’s degree. The new course Practical Aspects of Quality Management in Pharma and Biotech provides just that. The LACDR and LUMC set up the course together with the Biotech Training Facility, located at the Leiden Bio Science Park. The first…

Annette Righolt, Honours Coordinator at FGGA, and Mira Basta, Public Administration student, tell you more.

Lecture

Vivian van der Linde completed her masters Crisis & Security Management in the summer of 2020 by writing a thesis on Dieselgate. Freshly graduated, she felt she wanted to do more with her research. But how do you go about that, having just finished studying? Together with her thesis supervisor Wouter Jong…

There’s been a lot of commotion about the ‘Apartheid in Israel’ panel discussion being cancelled. The organisers, Students for Palestine, wanted to hold this at Leiden University’s Wijnhaven building in The Hague on 21 March. The Executive Board would only allow the event to go ahead if guarantees…

In the eighteenth century, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) housed its enslaved people on ‘Slave Island’ in Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka. Today ‘Slave Island’ is under serious threat from property developers. Senior lecturer Alicia Schrikker, together with her Sri Lankan colleagues Iromi Perera…

From the Spanish Flu during WWI to COVID-19: the role of the American government in these Pandemics. Professor Giles Scott-Smith, who together with Dario Fazzi and Gaetano Di Tommaso completed the book project Public Health and the American State, discusses a century of American responses to health…

She started her career in the police force, walking the beat as an officer. Now she has been appointed Extraordinary Professor of Diversity, Inclusion and Policing at Leiden University. Things have come full circle for Saniye Çelik. ‘It's very special.’

Lecture, LUCIS What's New?! Series

Zār jewellery from Egypt can be found in many museums and private collections in the West, but for a long time very little was known about it, except that it was used in rituals to protect against spirit possession. PhD candidate Sigrid van Roode has explored its history and discovered that the jewellery…

Space is becoming increasingly busier due to the launching of satellites and tourists. But no binding international agreements have been made since 1979. This is problematic, warns space lawyer Tanja Masson-Zwaan. ‘Everyone’s putting their own interests first.’

Research

On Things That Talk, a website founded and developed by Fresco Sam-Sin, students and researchers describe objects from today and from long ago. By now, more than a hundred objects have been covered. Willemijn Waal, Emma Verweij and Frank van den Boom contributed to the content.

He came to the Netherlands for three months and never left. Marcello Bonsangue is the new scientific director of the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) since January this year. 'I think it is important to be there for the people of our institute. My door is always open.'

The toe bone of a prehistoric deer carved with lines by Neanderthals 51,000 years ago is one of the oldest works of art ever found, according to a study released Monday. Leiden archaeologist Dr Andrew Sorensen, not involved in the study, reacts on the find in a news article by NBC News.

Lecture

The orbits of 27 stars orbiting closely around the black hole at the center of our Milky Way are very chaotic. As a result, researchers cannot predict with confidence where they will be in about 462 years. ‘That is astonishingly short,’ says astronomer Simon Portegies Zwart who collaborated on the r…

Jianfeng Ge and Milan Allen of Leiden University look for majorana quasiparticles using shot noise measurements

This academic year, we are welcoming several international students who have started studying at FGGA with a prestigious scholarship. We asked them about their background, their reasons for applying, and the application process. Congratulations to all students who have been awarded a scholarship!

Lecture, LUCIS Meets

Neeltje Blankenstein receives an LUF grant to conduct research on online risk behaviour among young people. What risks do young people take online and why? 'With this research, we not only want to help prevent serious risk behaviour, but also understand what drives young people to it.'