What inspires scholars who study the history, cultures, religions and languages of the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia? LUCIS interviewed scholars about their work and research in the video project “Passion in Profession”. The videos are available online now.

Leiden University offers courses about papyri and papyrology for beginners and more advanced students (BA and MA), both based on texts in translation as well as in the original source languages, from Egyptian to Greek, Latin and Arabic.

This Global and Comparative Philosophy master’s programme is unique in Europe. It offers comparative perspectives from around the world that will enable you to be part of the next generation of thinkers: someone studying and shaping philosophy for a globalised 21st century.

The hinterland of important centres like Petra (Southern Jordan) can provide essential information that contribute to the understanding of their rise, expansion and decline.

The refurbished P.J. Veth Building - the first completed sub-project in the Humanities Campus project - was officially opened in the summer of 2017. The Faculty of Humanities moved in straight away. . The building was meticulously transformed into a modern teaching building with attractive areas for…

The MA Middle Eastern Studies at Leiden University is a one-year, full-time programme taught entirely in English. With over four centuries of expertise in Middle Eastern scholarship, this programme offers you cutting-edge insights into the region’s history, politics, religion, languages, and culture…

The Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo offers Dutch language courses for Egyptian adults on a regular basis. These courses aim to provide students with language skills in Dutch, which they can use in everyday life. Therefore you will spend most of your time practicing the language in order to…

A project aimed at understanding the complicated process of religious transformation in one of the centres of the early Muslim world.

During the autumn semester (September–December), NIMAR offers an English taught minor that focuses on the study of Morocco from both a social sciences and humanities perspective. The semester teaches ethnographic research skills in a Moroccan setting. In addition, the semester provides an in-depth…

From 1967 to 1982, the United Nations undertook several peacekeeping operations in the Middle East. In his thesis from the Institute for History, Diego Salama examines how these operations were connected and their impact on the region.

Alfons Chorus was the ‘founding father’ of Psychology in Leiden. His son Rogier Chorus recently obtained his PhD at Leiden University based on his biography of his father. He talked to his Leiden PhD supervisor Willem Heiser about his father’s innovations, his plagiarism and how he was misunderstood…

This 25th volume in the series 'Islam in Africa', edited by Annachiara Raia, is a pioneering collection of poetry by the outstanding Kenyan poet, intellectual and imam Ustadh Mahmmoud Mau (born 1952) from Lamu island, once an Indian Ocean hub, now on the edge of the nation state.

From Crisis to Critique

LUCIS publishes two peer-reviewed book series, “Leiden Studies in Islam and Society” (Brill) and “Debates on Islam and Society” (Leiden University Press).

Asim Zubcevic defended his thesis on 11 November 2015

Assembling State, Space and Society on the Urban Margins in Morocco

The present monograph, spanning a wide range of world and local literatures represents a high academic standard of both literary criticism and philological analysis. By demonstrating her expertise as an Africanist conversant with the Arabic canon, Raia reveals how the narrative of Joseph has been re-narrated…

From the rise and fall of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, to Islamic State’s attempts to create its own currency, to the dramatic return of the Taliban in Afghanistan, this edited volume from two leading scholars of contemporary terrorism assembles an enviable array of international experts to explore these…

This book provides a grammatical sketch, glossed texts and a glossary of Tarifiyt Berber, which is the main heritage language of the Moroccan community in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany.

Wednesday 20 November 2024

Mr. Ade Jaya Suryani defended his thesis on 28 January 2021

While many European universities, Leiden included, have a proud tradition of research into Islamic studies, a topical and thematic focus on Shiʿi Islam in all its dispensation remains a desideratum.

Special Issue in: Visual Anthropology, Volume 29, Issue 3, 2016

LUCIS is directed by Nathal Dessing, who is advised by a steering committee.

Antonia Lamers, PhD at ICLON, researched how to create a TNE teaching and learning environment that is in line with the expectations of the British programmes offered to students in Oman.

The form and content of the course are determined by your answers on the intake form and, if necessary, an intake interview.

Political protest is often at least partially about the question of legitimacy. How can we distinguish whether a regime is legitimate, or merely purports to be so?

Islamic Thought and History (ITH) is a peer-reviewed book series that publishes new approaches to Islamic thought and the history of ideas in the Islamic civilisation.

Articles are published in Open Access at no cost to the author.

The Netherlands Institute in Turkey (NIT) conducts scholarly research and supports the academic study of Turkey through the ages. The institute is closely affiliated with University’s Faculty of Humanities. Its facilities are available to students and staff of all universities in the Netherlands.

This film will be screened on Sunday, 5 April 2026 at 7:00 pm.

During the ceremony of the Opening of the Academic Year, University Lecturer Arjan Louwen has won Leiden University's prestigious LUS Teaching Award. The prize, awarded annually by the Leiden University Student Platform (LUS), honours lecturers who excel in their teaching. For Louwen, the nomination…

For fifteen years, Recep Uysal carried out research on positive psychology in Turkey; it is even the subject of his PhD. That was until he had to flee Turkey and start again from scratch in the Netherlands. Re-entering the academic world was a challenge, but he rediscovered his love for the field in…

On November 16 a festschrift in honor of Dr Olivier Nieuwenhuyse was presented in a moving event at the Faculty of Archaeology. Professor Bleda Düring, a personal friend of Nieuwenhuyse, was one of the initiators. ‘If he had been here, he would have loved this book.’

Middle East Studies Lecture

The Israel-Palestine conflict regularly sparked intense debates in university lecturer Noa Schonmann's classes. She decided to start a podcast with journalist Rajaa Natour to teach her students to have deep and difficult conversations in a nuanced way.

On 21 September 2022 Arfiansyah successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

The unique geographic and temporal breadth of research at Leiden allows us to stimulate a shift from the classical Weberian mode of scholarly production that views historical development and modernization as emanating from Europe and the West to a multi-polar perspective that allows for more nuanced,…

The authors delve into the varying degrees to which institutions across different nations connect foreign events to their respective country's domestic affairs.