Five thousand years before the common era (BCE), Proto-Indo-European, the mother of many languages that are spoken today in Europe, Central Asia and South Asia, originated in eastern Europe. PhD candidate Axel Palmér has combined a 175-year-old hypothesis with new techniques to demonstrate how descendants…

Rik van Gijn was appointed professor of Ethnolinguistic Vitality and Diversity in the World from 1 December 2024. He is keen to use the position to set up research on language vitality. ‘People almost never give up their mother tongue entirely voluntarily.’

Conference

Conference

More efficient use of phosphorus fertilisers would make it possible to meet food demand in 2050, without using more of the world’s land for agriculture. This is what environmental scientists José Mogollón and colleagues have discovered by working out various future scenarios for food production and…

Smallholder farms in tropical regions can double their crop production by 2030 compared to 2015, a study finds to which José Mogollón (Institute of Environmental Sciences) contributed. But to achieve this, the farmers must increase the input of phosphorus beyond what is currently foreseen. The study…

Nitrogen deposition does not only affect plant biodiversity, but also strongly affects the composition of the remainder of the food web, through the changes in plant composition. In an unprecedented analysis of population changes of butterfly and moth species, an international research team including…

Leiden University regularly confers honorary doctorates, and presents awards and prizes.

Kiem project: How can metaphors be used to enhance societal engagement with quantum science and technology, and what factors influence their acceptance or resistance among experts and laypeople?

On 8 December, in honour of Human Rights Week, Roeland Böcker gave a public lecture about his experiences as ambassador to the Council of Europe. Between 2017 and 2021, Roeland Böcker was the representative of the Netherlands in the Council of Europe.

Leiden University's interdisciplinary research programme SAILS funds young interdisciplinary scientists working at the intersection of AI and other fields. How do these researchers experience the work?

The Data Science Research Programme at Leiden University combines data science with PhD projects in a wide range of disciplines. The programme has been running for over two years, and is producing the first astonishing results. A number of PhD candidates talk about their experiences and research bel…

A study concerning the collective memory in the region of the Bene lo Ya/ Ene lo I'ya, Sierra Norte, Oaxaca.

Knowledge and culture subproject 3:

Create a world of opportunities with a master's degree from Leiden University.

Leiden University has been promoting studies on Latin America and the Caribbean for a long time.

This special issue of the peer-reviewed journal Amsterdamer Beiträge zur älteren Germanistik (Brill, 2021) brings together articles that explore new digital ways of analyzing and annotating Old English vocabulary.

To what extent is the image of the Taino settlements on Hispaniola representative for the whole island, or is it only related to a few large settlements of known caciques?

What are the patterns and processes of human mobility in the pre-colonial circum-Caribbean as revealed by burial populations and what are the underlying motives and socio-cultural principles on both micro- and macro-scales?

Some examples of AI-research done at Leiden.

The Digital Humanities and Artificial Intelligence minor in the 2024-2025 academic year with options of 15 EC or 30 EC packages.

The role of religion in the identity construction of LGBTQIA+ folks

You've earned your degree and you’re ready to start your career. But where do you end up?

The Leiden University Graduate School of Humanities promotes the quality of our PhD candidates' selection, supervision, assessment, and training. Together with the Faculty institutes, the Graduate School of Humanities provides the organisational infrastructure within which PhD candidates participate…

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.

Find the answers to frequently asked questions about the Summer School here.

Leiden University offers ambitious students the opportunity to gain state-of-the-art knowledge, coupled with the freedom to develop their own area of expertise.

Are you ready to take on an extra challenge during your BA in Linguistics programme? With options like the Honours College, The Humanities Lab and the Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA), you can broaden your academic programme or add extra depth, intensity and ECTS – even a dual degree –…

The master’s programme of Latin American Studies offered by Leiden University supports the teaching and research of the social, cultural, historical, and linguistic diversity of contemporary Latin America, a region of mind-blowing diversity and global impact.

Your time at Leiden is about more than just studying. Some of your best experiences will stem from being a part of our lively and diverse student community, as well as from life in the beautiful city of Leiden.

Do you want to know more about the Bachelor of Linguistics, and experience what it’s like to study in Leiden? Leiden University offers you a variety of introductory activities to help you with your choice of study:

This research cluster explores processes of cultural creation, reception and transformation within a wide range of societal contexts from the early Middle Ages until c. 1800.

Psycholinguistic research

This PhD project investigates how language models can be used to extract structured knowledge from text in a way that is accurate, robust, and applicable to real-world use cases.

The Leiden University Centre for Digital Humanities regularly offers events and workshops related to all aspects of digital humanities. Events are aimed at connecting scholars from across Leiden's Faculties with a research interest in all digital aspects of their chosen subject area.

Conducting research on reliability of journalism and the trust in media.

Towards an international orientation in the field.

Professor Sjef Barbiers is leaving his job as scientific director of LUCL for the position of scientific director of the Institute for the Dutch Language (INT) from 1 September.

What’s it like to study a certain programme within the Faculty of Humanities at Leiden University? These prospective students found out during the Experience Day on Friday 6 April. They had a taste of the faculty’s atmosphere and discovered what study programmes are actually about.

The Choose a Language Day was created to make high school students enthusiastic about choosing a linguistic profile and further education. Third-years were able to learn about different language studies at the Faculty of Humanities.

The Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA) in The Hague offers bachelor’s and master’s programmes, minors, and research in security studies, covering cybersecurity, terrorism, diplomacy and contemporary security challenges. Focus keywords: ISGA, bachelor, master, minors, research, security…

Read more about the partner organizations of the Summerschool Global History in the 2020s.

Justin Bennett teaches in the Institute of Sonology of the Royal Conservatoire (KC) in the Hague. He is also a member of Jubilee, a platform for artistic research and production in Brussels.

Information about the situation in Ukraine

LUCAS members are experts in the fields of literary history and theory, film and media studies, and art, architectural, and book history.

The Russian threat to Europe, pro-Palestine protests, the passing of psychologist Andrea Evers and speculations on extraterrestrial life. These were among our most popular articles of the year.

How did people across Central and Eastern Europe imagine the future during the transitions of the 1980s and 1990s? The umbrella term ‘post-communism’ does not provide an answer to this question. This project explores how writers and cultural theorists saw the potential future of their societies during…

This dissertation aims to establish a dialogue between ethnomusicology (more specifically indigenous organology), the anthropology of art and the culture of the Apinaye peoples, in order to understand how the musical objects of these peoples are learned and taught, and thus to understand its musical…

The main topic of the book is the nature of inner aspect of the Verb Phrase, and the relation between the decompositional and the quantificational approaches to this problem.

Across cultures, parents help their children master the social and linguistic codes needed in adult life. Recent research on language socialization found important cross-cultural differences, pointing out the need for more diversity for a full understanding of this process.