As a student in Security Studies you are a socially engaged critical thinker eager to study real-life security cases in an academic setting. You focus not just on the broad context of these issues but also on the role of government, institutions and media. Want to know more? Sign up for one of our Open…

By Marieke Liem and Frans Koenraadt. Domestic homicide constitutes an extreme type of interpersonal violence. This book offers a much-needed synthesis of the literature on domestic homicide, covering its history; the theories supporting it; its various forms such as filicide, intimate partner homicide,…

Diana Dávila Gordillo, PhD candidate at Leiden University’s Institute of Political Science does field trips to her native Ecuador.

The UN has christened 21 November World Philosophy Day, a day on which ‘the enduring value of philosophy for the development of human thought, for each culture and for each individual’ is celebrated. But how should we celebrate it? We ask philosopher Victor Gijsbers.

For almost nine years, the Leiden Medievalists Blog has been one of the university’s most widely read blogs. Its 200th article was published recently. ‘We have so much excellent research; it needs a platform.’

For the spring semester 2025, the Austria Centre Leiden and the Institute History are excited to welcome Prof. Eva Pfanzelter to Leiden for her term as Visiting Professor in Central European Studies. Prof. Pfanzelter will teach two classes, give public talks in Leiden and around The Netherlands and…

De Tweede Kamer wordt de meest versplinterde ooit, met zeven partijen van drie zetels of minder. Waar verschillende experts waarschuwen voor bestuurlijke chaos, ziet hoogleraar staatsrecht, Wim Voermans, hierin juist de kracht van de Nederlandse democratie, zegt hij in het NRC.

Volgens hoogleraar staatsrecht Wim Voermans is een uitslag, waarbij twee of meer partijen exact gelijk eindigen in de Kamerverkiezingen, uniek en dat vraagt om een uiterst zorgvuldige aanpak, zegt hij in Sven op Radio 1.

Alumna Lisa Koolhoven is the granddaughter of a Rotterdam woman who experienced the ‘forgotten bombing’ of the city on 31 March 1943. Her friend Kristen Hayford has an American grandfather who served in the Air Force during the Second World War. In their podcast ‘Beb & Bob| Collateral Damage ’, they…

The master's specialisation in Visual Ethnography emphasises a strongly hands-on, empirical approach, which requires students to play an active role in mastering the audiovisual toolbox.

Our MA student Marie Costers from the University of Antwerp wrote about her experiences as a student at NVIC in Spring 2025!

Raymond Corbey holds a chair in both Philosophy of Science and Anthropology at the Faculty of Archaeology, to which he has been attached since 1993. The faculty’s 'embedded philosopher', as Dean Kolen likes to call him, is hard to pin down in terms of the usual specialties at the faculty because of…

The idea that prejudices about the (Middle)-East came to be during the colonisation of North-Africa in the 19th century is false. Mounir el-Badri wrote a cum laude bachelor thesis about orientalist judgments with which 18th century slaves in Morocco much earlier characterised their captors with.

War and terrorism overshadow interest in the pre-Islamic heritage of the Arabic peninsula. The new Leiden Centre for the Study of Ancient Arabia aims to make the general public more aware of the ancient history of this region.

LUMC and Leiden University will start the new two-year online master's program in Transfusion Medicine and Cellular and Tissue Therapies from October 2023.

Leiden University and the Roosevelt Institute for American Studies (RIAS) in Middelburg, previously the Roosevelt Study Center, will sign an agreement on 16 December 2017 confirming a strategic partnership.

Dirk Huyge (Director) & Wouter Claes (Vice-Director)

On 2 December, Roel Becker and Joyce Esser, both PhD candidates at the Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law, gave a lecture for their colleagues and the students of Res Publica, the master’s association Constitutional and Administrative Law. In the lecture, they paid attention to the…

Historian Frank Dikötter will receive an honorary doctorate from Leiden University for his work on the history of the Chinese Republican period and the People's Republic of China under Mao. He will be awarded the honorary degree during the university's Dies Natalis celebrations on 8 February 2017.

A new volume, co-edited by Nadine Akkerman of the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, shows how ladies-in-waiting, by 'creatively manipulating their gender', often played a major role in shaping the political climate of Europe in the early modern period.

An article by Janice McNab, post -doc researcher with ACPA, has been published by Religious Studies Review, Rice University. Title: Hilma af Klint and the Need for Historical Revision.

Simone Lemmers has been awarded a Leverhume trust funded PhD Position at the University of Durham, UK in the field of Biological Anthropology supervised by Dr. Jo Setchell (Antropology, Durham University) and Dr Wendy Dirks (Newcastle University) starting October 2013.

Research master's student in history Jesse Dijkshoorn collaborated on a transcription system for medieval texts. ‘It’s nice to make the Middle Ages accessible to people.’

The fastest chemical reaction in the universe takes place inside our eyes.

What did medieval scholars think of the books they read? In her inaugural lecture, Professor Mariken Teeuwen will talk about the texts they wrote in the margin.

After a lobby lasting many years, the Dutch government has decided to finance an independent study of the war of decolonisation (1945-1950) in the former Dutch East Indies. This is partly due to the work of Professor of Colonial and Post-Colonial History, Gert Oostindie, Director of the KITLV. ‘The…

Over the coming year, a quartermaster will explore the possibility of a Leiden Law Park in the centre of Leiden. In a building close to Leiden Law School, researchers, students and legal companies and start-ups would together address the topics of technology, law and ethics.

A new study carried out by Leiden archaeologists Hadar Ahituv and Amanda Henry, together with international colleagues, reports the identification and analysis of 650 starch grains preserved on basalt percussive tools (anvils and hammerstones) found at an early Middle Pleistocene site in Israel. These…

Recently a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed between the Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML) - Leiden University and the Mulawarman university in Samarinda, Kalimatan province, Indonesia. The MOU will be effective for a period of five years and covers the intention to collaborate in…

The court has dismissed Ratko Mladić’s appeal and upheld his life sentence for genocide and war crimes. The verdict is one of Yugoslavia tribunal’s last. Mission accomplished?

Who has control over which piece of land? Since independence in 2002 East Timor has been struggling to create a land tenure system that can deal with the grievances of past colonial ruling and conflict, and address the needs of its citizens, says researcher Bernardo Almeida. PhD defence on September…

In August 2010 the Faculty of Archaeology conducted an excavation in the Maashorst-area, situated in the northeastern part of Brabant.

Criminals? They are always men. At least, that’s what we tend to think. Historian Manon van der Heijden wants to show, however, that between 1600 and 1900 in Europe, women were responsible for a substantial share of the criminal activity. She has been granted a VICI award for her research.

Dr. Sarah Cramsey, University Lecturer Judaism & Diaspora Studies, has been awarded an Early Career Partnership by the KNAW.

We are delighted to welcome Elisabeth Faber as our new intern for the Fall semester 2022.

We have been working from home for over 9 weeks. How are the staff members of the Institute for History doing? Andrew Gawthorpe shares his experience below.

On the eve of Leiden University’s 450th anniversary, the 1574th and 1575th Honours College students received their honours certificates. In a crowded Scheltema, people celebrated ‘that so many students have had the opportunity to broaden their horizons.’

What does the UN seek to achieve though global observance days, weeks and years and how have these initiatives impacted the role of the organization in forwarding the agenda of human rights?

According to a new study by an international team of researchers from the Caribbean, Europe and North America, the Caribbean was settled by several successive population dispersals that originated on the American mainland.

Are you interested in ancient Egypt, the rich cultural heritage of Mesopotamia or bliblical Hebrew and Aramaic? Students of all faculties can follow electives of Ancient Near Eastern Studies without prior knowledge or special entry requirements. Archaeology student Annely Arends talks about her expe…

For decades it was thought that the family system of the ancient Egyptians was very similar to our own. However, PhD candidate Steffie van Gompel explains that the reality is somewhat different. ‘In Egyptian families, it was often the eldest son versus the rest of the children.’

DIRTY PICTURES // 26 March 2021// Trigger, FOMU, Antwerp (BE)

Prof.dr. Annelou van Gijn has obtained a Marie Curie subsidy for research on wetland activity patterns in Mesolithic Northwest Europe. This funding has been used to employ the researcher dr. Aimée Little. The project will commence in November 2011.

Mexico is currently facing an unprecedented social and political crisis, with expanding criminal and political violence, rampant impunity and crumbling political institutions. Next to the daily report of anonymous victims of violence, last summer in Central Mexico at least 15 citizens were executed…

Andrew Shield (35) is a University Lecturer at Leiden University and the cofounder of the Leiden Queer History Network. History, migration and sexuality are all subjects he is passionate about and teaches in. He wrote a book about immigrants during the sexual revolution, as well as one on contemporary…

What practical steps can we take to resolve cross-border claims to looted art and prevent illicit trafficking in cultural goods? That's what the European Parliament asked Leiden legal scholar Evelien Campfens. Her advice: develop a registration system, issue art with a ‘passport’ and set up a European…

Rebekka Grossmann awarded Gerald Westheimer Career Development Fellowship for research on the effects of migration on visual codes of global solidarity

January 1st 2017, Bastiaan Steffens will be taking up the Graduate Teaching Assistance PhD position at the Archaeology and Ancient History department at Leicester University.