Germany has an important position in Europe, both economically as well as politically and culturally. In the Bachelor's programme German Language and Culture you will dive into the rich language, history and literature of this influencial country and discover what it has to offer!

Lecture, Lunch Time Talk

In the Bachelor's programme Japanese Studies at Leiden University you will study the rich history and age-old traditions of Japan. Discover the fascinating country of haiku, samurai, geishas and manga.

Contact information for the Leiden University Centre for International Relations.

The project '‘The Temporality of Images: Merleau-Ponty’s Visual Ontology and its Resonances with Chinese Landscape Painting.’, in the most concise terms, explores ontological questions through the lens of images, drawing on phenomenology, iconology, art history, and comparative philosophy.

During the master’s programme in Modern Dutch Literature at Leiden University you will learn to scientifically analyse literary texts, as well as other Dutch cultural texts, such as those found in hiphop songs and diaries.

In the master’s programme in Dutch Discourse Studies at Leiden University you will study rhetoric and argumentation, and you will specifically focus on research into pragmatics, stylistics, genre research and persuasion.

Leiden University is famous for its library’s large collection of Oriental manuscripts. Part of this collection is a group of 104 Arabic documents written on papyrus and paper (Or. 8264 and 12885). These documents date from the 7th through 10th century CE and cover a wide range of subjects (private…

States, we are told, have monopolized the legal right to wage war since the seventeenth century and this arrangement has provided some basic stability in international relations. But is this really true? This project challenges this classic account and opens the way for rethinking the contemporary laws…

This book looks to existential thinkers for reasons to hope immortal life could be worth living. It injects new arguments and insights into the debate about the desirability of immortality, and tackles related issues such as boredom, personal identity, technological progress, and the meaning of life…

Many members of the Royal Family have studied at Leiden University and several have been awarded an honorary doctorate.

Archaeological and Historical Perspectives on Eastern Cuisine and Western Foodways

On the 14th of June, Yliana Rodriquez successfully defended a doctoral thesis. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Yliana on this achievement!

As a practice in which human beings were held captive for an indefinite period of time, coerced into extremely dependent and exploitative power relationships, denied rights (including rights over their labor, lives, and bodies), often vulnerable to forced relocation by various means, and forced to labor…

Imami Shiʿism was a key part of the turbulent thesis and antithesis which formed Islam, and it remains greatly influential today. The aim of the ImBod project is to write the first comprehensive social history of the Imamate.

Audrey Heijns defended her thesis on 28 June 2016

The Darién region of Panama is the only land bridge connecting North, Central and South America. Nowadays home to descendants of African enslaved peoples, Indigenous peoples (Emberá, Wounaan, and Guna), and mestizos, Darién has been and still is fundamental to connectivity, cultural interchange, and…

On Thursday 1 December 2016 at 13.45 hrs, Francisco Sepulveda Ramirez will defend his doctoral thesis ‘Residence in Tax Treaties' at the Academy Building of Leiden University. Supervisor is Professor F.A. Engelen.

The Pontine Region Project (PRP) is an on-going archaeological project that aims to study the long-term history of settlement and landscape in the Pontine region

Plant exudates appeared long time ago in the history line of life in the early Devonian. They are typical saps produced by specialized cells.

This book analyses the emergence of modern parties in nineteenth-century Europe and explores their connection with the slowly developing institution of democracy.

This is the first reference work to describe the history of embroidery throughout Central Asia, the Iranian Plateau and the Indian Subcontinent from the medieval period through to the present. It offers an authoritative guide to all the major embroidery traditions of the region and a detailed examination…

Shining a new light on the Roman world

Caribbean archaeological heritage is threatened by natural impacts but also increasingly by economic developments, often resulting from the tourist industry. The continuous construction of specific projects for tourists, accompanied by illegal practices such as looting and sand mining, have major impacts…

The main aim of this project is to provide a full analysis of the actual influence of French on Dutch in The Netherlands during the period of 1500 - 1900.

The wealth of shoes, sandals and other footwear from ancient Egypt is poorly understood due to lack of research. This is remarkable, because from the very beginning of Egypt’s long history footwear served practical as well as more spiritual purposes.

This book explores how changes in the patterns of cooperation and conflict among states, regional actors and transnational non-state actors have affected the rise of emerging global powers and the suggested decline of US leadership. Scholars, students and policy practitioners who are interested in the…

This study describes religion in Java.

On the 31 March 2022 Mr. Taufiq Hanafi successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

On 18 October 2022 ms. Comstock-Skipp successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Travel back in time and learn about how the University has changed over the centuries.

Tracing Transitional English in the Twelfth Century

Ms. Anaïs Massot defended her thesis on 26 January 2021

Four years of protracted negotiations and bitter warfare passed between the declaration of Indonesian independence on 17 August, 1945, and the official transfer of sovereignty on 27 December, 1949.

How did institutions and structures operate throughout the Muslim world from the earliest history of Islam into the early modern period?

Identifying and explaining change in the structure of central state bureaucracies and the determinants of survival of individual public organizations are two closely related areas of research in public administration. We aim to bridge the gap between these two main strands of studies of organizational…

The Garden Club is a ProParte sub-group.

The 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami caused immense destruction and over 170,000 deaths in the Indonesian province of Aceh. The disaster spurred large-scale social and political changes in Aceh, including the intensified implementation of shari‘a law and an end to the long separatist conflict. After the Tsunami…

Recently, Europe was again shaken by some attacks. This ‘Elementair Deeltje’ places terrorism in a historical perspective and gives an up-to-date overview of this form of political violence.

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.

The study of language in change.

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 cultural sequence of western coastal French Guiana from 5000 BP to present

Get the most out of your studies at Leiden University by taking part in our extracurricular activities.

Get the most out of your studies at Leiden University by taking part in our extracurricular activities.

This summer school will explore the concept of socioeconomic diplomacy in the context of global empire building (16th-19th centuries).

Get the most out of your studies at Leiden University by taking part in our extracurricular activities.

The master’s programme in Film and Photographic Studies at Leiden University covers the history and theory of film and photography within the broad context of visual and other media.

This is an Erasmus+ International Credit Mobility project of the Faculty of Humanities with the Anton de Kom University in Paramaribo.