This project investigates the influence that Arabic (esp. dialectal Arabic) has had on the Berber languages of Northern Africa.

Exploring the language of the lower classes in the nineteenth century

Jochem van den Boogert defended his thesis on 18 November 2015

In our culture, vocal harmonics function as independent musical elements since only a few decades. Thresholds of the audible explores the changing relationship between singers, listeners and harmonics.

On the 26th of May Sudarmoko successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

On Thursday 10 April 2025 Wahyu Widodo successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Alternative perspectives and sources of colonial literature haven’t received much attention before now. School books have long ignored the violence that accompanies colonialsm. How can we paint an honest picture?

This project proceeds from the observation that since the second half of the twentieth century, forgiveness and reconciliation have become pervasive themes in western culture, both on a political level and in personal relations.

This interdisciplinary study focuses on (trans)national ethnic and popular networks, combining historical-ethnographic and computational methods to understand the ‘workings’ of networked conflict interfering in the increasingly violent conflict in the Sahel (Africa) and beyond. The project focuses on…

On March 12th, Jonathan Brown succesfully defended his doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Jonathan on this great result.

Lecture, Sign Languages & Deaf People

The one-year master in Southeast Asian Studies, a specialisation of Leiden University’s master in Asian Studies, offers a large and varied selection of subjects and the freedom to choose the areas on which you will focus.

Stylianos Irakleous defended his thesis on 6 February 2020

A fascinating description of a global language, A Grammar of Mandarin by Jeroen Wiedenhof combines broad perspectives with illuminating depth.

The present study comprises a classification and analysis of the syntax of the non-verbal clause in Qumran Hebrew, i.e. the linguistic variety (or varieties) found in the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls. The corpus consists of the non-biblical texts written in Hebrew; biblical texts and texts written in…

This PhD project investigates what the universal and variable morphosyntactic properties of linguistic expressions of otherness are and how they can be modelled theoretically.

Conference

Alumni event, Lustrum

Prof. J. (Jos) Schaeken, Professor of Slavic and Baltic Languages and Cultural History, will be the interim Vice-Dean of the Faculty of Humanities from 1 March 2025. He will succeed the present Vice-Dean, Mirjam de Baar, who will complete her second term on that date.

Open access, online talks on African Sign Language Studies, in International sign and English

International scholarly publisher Brill has released the most complete and up-to-date reference work on the Chinese language available today. Prof.dr. Rint Sybesma oversaw the project as Editor-in-Chief.

President Joko Widodo was received on 22 April in the Academy Building at the Rapenburg by Rector Magnificus Carel Stolker and Henri Lenferink, Mayor of Leiden. Jet Bussemaker, Minister of Education, Culture and Science, was also present.

Study information

To what extent do aspects of fluency fluctuate throughout time? And how do raters take the dynamicity of fluency into account when rating performances?

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

Study information

For more than 1500 years, Confucianism has played a major role in shaping Japan's history - from the formation of the first Japanese states during the first millennium AD, to Japan's modernization in the nineteenth century, to World War II and its still unresolved legacies across East Asia today.

Kathryn Emerson defended her thesis on 28 June 2016

Language connects us! We are here to help you! The Academic Language Centre (ATC) is the language centre of Leiden University. As the oldest university language centre in the Netherlands, we offer language courses in a wide range of languages, both for beginners and advanced students. All courses are…

From the smallest level of interaction among families and close friends, over the meso-level of schools, shops, churches, religious communities and companies, to the highest level of nation-states and international organisations: Language Policy and Planning (LPP) is everywhere!

On the 16th of December, Yachan Liang successfully defended a doctoral thesis. Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Yachan on this achievement!

Like any language, the natural sign languages of deaf communities differ from each other in their grammars and lexicons. A growing number of studies indicates that sign languages make use of the gestures of hearing speakers to build linguistic structure. This implies that variation and similarities…

How did common people write in the late eighteenth century? Little is yet known on this topic, since our knowledge is mainly based on printed texts written by a small part of the (male) elite population. This dissertation – written from a sociolinguistic point of view – gives us new insights into late-…

The Leiden-Delft-Erasmus (LDE) alliance signed a collaboration agreement with the Indonesian Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Technology on 23 September.

Languages of The Hague is a collection of columns on languages and language which were published between 2016 and 2018 in the weekly newspaper Den Haag Centraal.

The Academic Language Centre Leiden offers French language courses at eight different levels, an intensive summer course and customised French language training. The courses are practical in nature: focusing on the use of the language. More information can be found here >

The Academic Language Center Leiden offers Korean language courses at various levels and customized Korean language training. The courses are practical in nature: focused on the use of the language. More information can be found here >

The Academic Language Centre Leiden offers Spanish language courses at ten different levels, an intensive summer course and tailor-made Spanish language training. The courses are practical in nature: focusing on the use of the language. More information can be found here >