Sander van Kasteren only noticed some small, subtle changes since he was appointed professor on 1 May. Still, he has to get used to the idea, even though he had been working towards the professorship for a few years. ‘I don't quite see myself as a professor yet.'

Social scientists from Leiden University have worked with an international team to create teaching modules on migration.

Met haar spannende onderzoek naar strafrechtelijke waarheidsvinding in Europa sleept Linda Geven dit jaar de Gratama Wetenschapsprijs voor jonge talentvolle wetenschappers in de wacht.

Museum De Lakenhal issued an open call for creative solutions to the problem of growth addiction. From over 500 submissions, they selected 15 artworks for the exhibition 'If things grow wrong'. These include the creations of Leiden researchers Peter van der Putten and Evert Jan van Leeuwen.

This fall, LUCIS will have the pleasure of welcoming Professor Emeritus Geert Jan van Gelder to Leiden. He is the second Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain Cultural Foundation Visiting Professor in Arabic Culture at Leiden University.

Dr Erik Kwakkel, Leiden specialist on medieval manuscripts, has one foot in the world of medieval book production and the other firmly planted in the modern environment of social media. He is co-editor of Author, Reader, Book aimed at specialists in medieval authorship, and tweets daily to bring the…

Nadine Akkerman has deciphered the correspondence of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia, and studied 17th-century spies. Her fascinating historiographies have now been recognised with membership of the Young Academy.

Tailoring teaching to students’ learning needs in speaking skills in modern foreign languages is desirable, but difficult to achieve in regular classes in secondary schools. Esther de Vrind, PhD, manager and teacher educator at ICLON, developed a method to make this easier. Defence on 25 November.

On August 18, 2022, Henk Bodewitz, distinguished Indologist and emeritus professor of Sanskrit at Leiden University, passed away in his hometown of Utrecht.

The underwater world around present-day Indonesia has changed greatly in recent centuries as a result of human activity. University lecturer Johannes Müller has been awarded an NWO XS grant to map the history of the Indonesian ecosystems.

What does it mean to be a migrant in a big city? According to assistant professor Kamila Krakowska Rodrigues, artists have the answer to that question. In a new ERC-funded project, she will explore the representation of contemporary urban diversity in films, performance art, written literature and spoken…

The international World Cultural Council (WCC) has awarded Nadine Akkerman, Victoria Nyst and Alicia Schrikker with Special Recognition Awards given to young scientists at the university organising the award ceremony. Leiden University organises the 34th WCC award ceremony this year.

A film and quiz at the Old Observatory, a film whose ending you decide or a political satire in The Hague. These are some of the options at Science & Cinema, the 444 edition, a special programme during LIFF, the Leiden International Film Festival.

Writer in residence Ronald Giphart will explore a number of his own fascinations with Leiden students.

The NWO just announced the results of the Vrije Competitie proposals. Paul Smith, professor at the French department is, as a member of LUCAS, one of three scholars within the Faculty of Humanities at Leiden University who has been awarded this grant.

To generate renewable energy takes more space than one might think. New research by environmental scientist Paul Behrens and master's student John van Zalk shows how much space is needed for nine specific types of energy. Biomass, hydro and wind, while vital, take up the most space. Natural gas and…

It was a remarkable trend in 19th-century London: middle-class bourgeois bohemians falling in love with anarchism and its assassins. University lecturer Michael Newton has been awarded a NIAS subsidy to reconstruct the lives of three of these families.

Biotechnological developments are moving fast. From genetically modified plant varieties we are now moving to cultured meat. These developments require moral interpretation - and they get it in the form of art. Lotte Pet wrote a dissertation about it.

How did manioc, a poisonous root, become the staple of Amazonia and change the lives of prehistoric Amazonian peoples? Veni grant recipient, Konrad Rybka aims to unravel this mystery using a variety of research methods across different disciplines.

For the first time in the history of the Van den Berg prize, there are two winners: the ‘traditional’ one for the best thesis by a student in the Dutch bachelor’s programmes in Political Science, and, as of 2020, one for a graduate from the International Relations and Organisations (IRO) specialisation.…

Ron Sela, Associate Professor of Central Asian History in the Department of Central Eurasian Studies at Indiana University – Bloomington, will be the Central Asia Visiting Professor from 19 until 25 May 2017. Ron Sela will deliver a guest lecture and a master class within the Central Asia Initiative…

A workshop (Cairo, Egypt, 14-15 September 2018) organized by the Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo with support from “DICIS” / Digital Cinema Studies https://www.digitalcinemastudies.com/

Together with the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and creative partner Big Orange, Laura Bertens, Sara Polak, Yra van Dijk, and Thony Visser will investigate possible uses of the voice in cultural memory.

The LUCAS Audience Award 2021 has been awarded to Nadine Akkerman. This is a prize for researchers who appeal to an audience wider than the academic community. The prize consists of 1000 euros, a trophy and eternal fame.

As of 1 February 2015, dr. David Napolitano is postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for History. He is particularly interested in the figure of the medieval city magistrate.

Interview for National Public Radio sparks media frenzy.

Master’s student of Linguistics Marten van der Meulen helped organise the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) Miracles of Human Language, which ran from 30 March until 11 May 2015. What was it like for a student to organise an MOOC? And what did he learn from it?

South African poet Antjie Krog will be the writer in residence at Leiden University in autumn 2021. Krog is famous for her poetry collections and books, which are often inspired by the history of South Africa. In her role as writer in residence, she will give the annual Albert Verwey Lecture and a series…

How much mortgage interest can I claim back according to law? Or maintenance payments, how much do the tax authorities let me deduct? Many citizens struggle with questions about the application of tax legislation. Roberto van den Heuvel investigated in what way tax legislation should provide clarity…

Teaching people to recognize subtle, real-world expressions will help them understand and trust others better. The aim of Mariska Kret is to develop an interactive virtual-reality training tool (E-VIRT) for a broad group of users, including patients. Kret provides a brief description of her idea for…

The Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies at Princeton University annually offers a limited number of Visiting Research Fellowships for scholars in the humanities or the social sciences worldwide, who wish to spend time in residence at Princeton pursuing independent research projects, free of teaching…

The idea that socially anxious people avoid eye contact because they are not interested in other people needs to be changed. They take their information from other physical sources, such as people's hands. This is the finding of Leiden psychologist Mariska Kret whose research has been published in…

On the brand-new Leiden Teachers Blog, Leiden teachers share their experiences with educational innovation. They show colleagues, students, and everyone else who is interested the different facets of creating university education.

Author Bibi Dumon Tak will be the new writer-in-residence at Leiden University from autumn 2020.

For many new international students, moving to the Netherlands and getting used to Dutch culture and customs can be quite challenging. Luckily the Humanities Buddy Programme is here to help! The new coordinator of the programme, Bob van der Horst, will introduce himself and explain more about the buddy…

This fall, LUCIS will have the pleasure of welcoming Professor Wadad Kadi, of the University of Chicago, to Leiden. She is the first Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain Cultural Foundation Visiting Professor in Arabic Culture at Leiden University.

We talk too little about silence, thinks university lecturer Gerlov van Engelenhoven. He has been awarded a Veni grant to investigate the role of silence in protest movements. Does silence sometimes really say more than a thousand words?

Sara Polak, American Studies expert and University Lecturer investigates how American presidents deal with the media and how new, social media influence our collective memory and the political game. ‘Social media algorithms influence us and our political choices in ways we do not foresee’, Polak say…

If you have a plan that could improve the education or the learning environment of the Faculty of Humanities in terms of diversity or inclusion, you can apply for a grant from the faculty’s JEDI Fund. This year, Nasreen has been helping to develop a new syllabus for the first-year Ancient History co…

The Guggenheim Fellowship is a prestigious award for US nationals. There are more than 3,000 applications every year, and this year only 188 were honoured. Professor Jonathan Silk is one of these 188, the first ever at Leiden University, and he tells us more about the fellowship and what he will do…

It is late June, and on a windy meadow north of Leiden known as the Vrouw Vennepolder a group of archaeology students just hit the last ice age. Considering this involves manually pushing a ground core to a depth of 10 meters, this is no small feat. Even so, the taking of ground samples in this, at…

During the Faculty of Archaeology’s 2018 Field School excavation, in Leiden, two Early Medieval burials were encountered, as well as some house plans. One of the burials was found by Beatriz, an international student from Mexico. “When I found the pelvis bone it was clear that I had found a human sk…

Anyone who has taken a walk through the centre of Leiden before might have come across him, an attentive group of tourists gathered around. After studying history, Koen van Toen, or Koen Marijt, started his own business. He now organises historical walks, among other things.

Colonial art and artefacts were not necessarily looted. Pieter ter Keurs, Professor of Museums, Collections and Society, calls for more nuance in the debate on art and collectors’ items from a loaded past. Inaugural speech on 2 December.

VVIK Symposium

The world’s attention will shift to China as the Communist Party is set to hold its five-yearly congress beginning on 16 October. We talk to Senior University Lecturer Florian Schneider about how its leader Xi Jinping is expected to cement his place as the country’s most powerful leader since Mao Ze…

Conference, Summer school