Chinese organisations increasingly operate across the borders of China, and growing numbers of people from outside China are coming to live there. Professor Frank Pieke believes these movements have a significant effect on central and local government policy in China.

Lu, Man defended his thesis on 28 September 2017.

These courses address all language skills: speaking, writing, listening and reading.

This thesis presents a thorough survey of the central aspects of the phonology of Shaoxing Chinese from a synchronic perspective and on the basis of recent theoretical phonological developments, with the secondary goal of casting some light on current issues in Modern Chinese (Mandarin).

On 19 September 2023 Tabitha Speelman successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

LIAS aims to advance the globally conscious vision of area studies, both within and outside the academic community. Focusing on Asia and the Middle East, the institute is a meeting place of multiple fields of inquiry, theories and methods, historical periods, and areas.

The rapid economic development of recent decades has made China a destination for migrants from all parts of the world. What does Chinese migration policy say about the priorities and functioning of this global power? PhD candidate Tabitha Speelman has conducted research on this.

Postcolonial Displacements explores the multiple ways in which migration in South Asia contributes to the imagining, questioning, subverting and reframing of territories, nations and communities. The project focuses on the contested fringes of the politically divided South Asian subcontinent, across…

This study proposes a theory for the encoding of specificity and definiteness in the Chinese nominal based on Cantonese, Mandarin and Wenzhou data.

Tonal bilinguals of two closely related Chinese dialects are amazing people. They handle two tonal systems in their mind; their two vocabularies are from closely related dialects, and they write translation equivalents with common Chinese characters. Their unique language situation makes their mind…

Chinese Linguistics at Leiden University offers you an excellent opportunity to benefit from our long-standing expertise in Chinese linguistics

The Encyclopedia of Global Human Migration provides a complete exploration of the prominent themes, events, and theoretical underpinnings of the movements of human populations from prehistory to the present day.

On 18 May 2022 Lan-Yi Yang successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Taught by top researchers from a wide range of disciplines, the MA Chinese Studies at Leiden University combines in-depth knowledge with advanced language proficiency with a year-long stay in China.

The Academic Language Centre Leiden offers Chinese language courses at three different levels and tailor-made Chinese language courses. The courses are practical in nature: focusing on the use of the language. More information can be found here >

Over a billion people live in China, it has the most spoken language in the world and is a major player on the world stage. Do you want to broaden your knowledge about this fascinating and powerful country? Study the language, culture, economy and politics on a high academic level with China Studies…

In Migration and Membership Regimes editors Ulbe Bosma, Gijs Kessler and Leo Lucassen bring together ten essays in an analytical framework which looks beyond the Transatlantic migration of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in a deliberate attempt to incorporate the experience of earlier periods…

This project is a three-year collaborative research between European and Chinese researchers (2015-2018). As a part of the China-Europe “Understanding Population Change” Collaborative Research Initiative, the project utilizes multidisciplinary research methodologies (social and cultural anthropology,…

Mei-Wen Chen defended her thesis on 29 June 2016

What are the differences between the trade in Chinese herbal drugs in Europe between 1800 and now? Can we see the major metabolic changes after 200 yours?

Globalization, migration, technological innovation and climate change pose challenges to citizens in European countries. These challenges test the limits of cross-national and cross-generational solidarities, touching upon the very foundations of governance and society. This research program aims at…

In this research, for the first time a detailed description as well as systematic and comparative analysis of the final particle system in Chinese are provided.

Lecture, CHiLL series

The proposed project evaluates how the vulnerability of migrant men and women was constructed in political, public and media discourses, and how differences in the constructed vulnerability influenced the decision to migrate, the migration process, and the subsequent settlement process.

Migration and Mobility in the Early Roman Empire by Luuk de Ligt and Laurens E. Tacoma (Eds.)

Although migration and integration have become important concepts today as a result of globalization, migration movements, integration, and multiculturalism have always been part of the history of Europe. Few people realize how many ethnic groups participated in migration within Europe or into Europe…

One million migrant workers are employed in the Netherlands, often in poor conditions. If we want to reduce labour migration, we need to restructure the economy, says economist Olaf van Vliet. Either way, we need to address abuses, says FNV lawyer Imke van Gardingen.

This research project focuses on the interaction of Buddhist institutions, Chinese central and local governments, and local gentry in the 'transforming temples into schools' movement.

Subproject of

PACES is an innovative, inter-disciplinary and multi-level research project that asks, How do changes in society, individual life experiences and migration policy shape decisions to stay or to migrate over time and across countries? And how can this knowledge inform future migration policies and gov…

This thesis investigates the connection between tonal realization and tone change (tone sandhi) in Wenzhou Chinese, and whether and how such a connection is conditioned by prosodic structure and focus marking.

Migration is an important topic of academic, public and political debate. Migration research generates a wealth of articles. The Journal of Migration History (JMH) is the first to specialize in the field. Articles on migration history either appear in journals that specialize on current issues, or in…

This study examines the mutual intelligibility between all 225 pairs of 15 Chinese dialects, in two main branches, i.e., six Mandarin dialects and nine non-Mandarin (Southern) dialects.

Social Citizenship & Migration (SCM) is one of the nine interdisciplinary programmes launched by Leiden University in 2020. It is led by the Faculties of Governance and Global Affairs, Law, Humanities, and Social Science.

Through a lens that examines the intersection of ageing, gender, class, and migration, this project addresses the 'care deficit' in European countries and the employment of migrant women from Latin America to fill this deficit.

The key subject of the research programme Cities, Migration and Global Interdependence 1500-now (CMGI) is Inequality (at local, national and global levels). We study this from an intersectional perspective: gender, class, ethnicity or race, religion, sexuality, age, ability/disability, citizenship and…

How has migration affected Irish and Italy society since 1945?

This volume edited by Jan Lucassen and Leo Lucassen aims to quantify and qualify cross-cultural global migrations and was published in the series 'Studies in Global Migration History'.

China is a one-party regime, yet elections are held for the local congresses. PhD candidate Wang Zhongyuan investigated how the Communist Party uses this democratic instrument to strengthen the authoritarian regime. PhD defence 31 January.

This study presents the first systematic investigation and detailed theoretical analysis of the temporal interpretations of sentences with bare (aspectually unmarked) predicates in Mandarin.

Today, knowledge is the most crucial element to stimulate organizational competitiveness and economic development.