The Staff Alliance for Equity (SAFE) is a bottom-up platform open to staff of all levels, irrespective of contractual status. The presence and activities of SAFE extend our commitment to the Code of Conduct of the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs, which ‘wishes to offer all students and staff…

The ERC project 'Food citizens?' is a comparative analysis of a growing phenomenon in Europe: collective food procurement, namely networks of people who organize direct food production, distribution, and consumption.

'Food Citizens? An anthropological project on collective food procurement in European cities

Rebecca Tompkins defended her thesis on 21 March 2019

What role(s) do border officials play in the enforcement and management of border control and border mobilities and how do these roles relate to the personal, organisational and larger societal context within which these officials operate?

This research project seeks to understand the dynamics in the relationship between social media, mobile telephony and the social fabric under duress in Africa's mobile margins. It combines studies on mobility/migration, conflict and communication in an attempt to uncover these new dynamics, which have…

This programme examines cultural space, national identity and the politics of tangible and intangible heritage in Islamic Central Asia.

This project focuses on urban commercial space in Roman Italy and deals with the impact of economic growth on urban communities in the late Republic and the Imperial period (200 BCE – 300 CE).

On Wednesday 24 September 2025 Marija Šerić successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Language is omnipresent: when you talk, app or meet in Teams. Understanding how we communicate with one another and what communication does to us is essential. In her inaugural lecture, Nivja de Jong will call to redress the balance between the sciences and the humanities.

As part of the Leiden Heritage Deal, the Municipality of Leiden collaborates with Leiden University, Naturalis, and the Leiden Regional Heritage Office, to study the climate challenges facing the city centre and its historic green and blue networks. The goal is to contribute to a biodiverse, climate-resilient…

The complexities of modernization in Brazil and Graciliano Ramos significance for our understanding of Brazil today.

In Slaving Zones: Cultural Identities, Ideologies, and Institutions in the Evolution of Global Slavery, fourteen authors—including both world-leading and emerging historians of slavery—engage with the ‘Slaving Zones’ theory.

In this dissertation I argue that the proto-daoist text the Zhuangzi and the ethical relation of Levinas are fruitful resources to reconsider the self-other relation in comparative philosophy.

This third issue of Ex Novo gathers multidisciplinary contributions addressing mobility to understand patterns of change and continuity in past worlds; reconsider the movement of people, objects, and ideas alongside mobile epistemologies, such as intellectual, scholarly or educative traditions, rituals,…

How are night spaces imagined, produced, experienced and narrated by migrant communities in Europe? This research project considers this question in eight European cities: Aarhus, Amsterdam, Berlin, Cork, Galway, Lisbon, London, Rotterdam. Authorities have historically wrestled with the issue of night-time…

Having open conversations about diversity and inclusion is an important first step towards change. Yet, such conversation can be emotional and vulnerable, and at times uncomfortable to initiate and sustain. The 'What’s Your Story?' Card Game aims to enable participants to exchange and respond to stories…

Explore philosophical research and education at the Leiden Institute for Philosophy. Our scholars study knowledge, ethics and existence, connecting classical and contemporary thought.

The main aim of this research is to understand the dynamics of identity within indigenous Caribbean communities as expressed through the practice of intentional cranial modification. A multidisciplinary approach will be applied to achieve this aim, combining current anthropological and sociological…

Paleobotanist Menno Booi discovered that 250 previously described fossil tree species are objectively not distinguishable; they belong to only one single species.

The mission of Thamyris/Intersecting is to rigorously bring into encounter the crucial insights of black and ethnic studies, gender studies, and queer studies, and facilitate dialogue and confrontations between them.

Representing Japanese Colonial 'Heritage' in Taiwan

Taking as a point of departure the Italian American community in Boston and its process of collective remembrance surrounding Saint Anthony’s Feast, we address the limits and potential of montage.

On Wednesday 21 May Adrian Perkasa successfully defended a doctoral thesis and graduated.

Museums are powerful and influential institutions in their ability to shape knowledge and contribute to our identity. What we preserve and how we present our collections and heritage is closely connected to our identity and culture. In the multidisciplinary Museums, Heritage and Collections, you'll…

This article studies the securitization of immigration in the United States of America (U.S.), through the analysis of the National Security Strategies (NSS) published between 2002 and 2017, using a two-layered analytical framework that combines securitization theory and agenda setting theory.

Why are people sometimes unable to change, even if they want to? Why is it so difficult to change political institutions, or to abandon outdated ways of thinking? This book suggests that we can understand the phenomenon of resistance to change in individuals and institutions by returning to Hegel, one…

In this dissertation the notions of category and type are studied through the lens of logical syntax.

From the formative period of Islam to the contemporary world, Muslims have negotiated changing modalities of being Muslim.

ERC Starting Grant: The Van Manen Project. This five year project (2023-2028) is made possible with an ERC Starting Grant. It aims to (digitally) reunite all parts of the Van Manen Collection. This enables us to study it as a whole, helping us to understand the process of collection formation. More…

What is the iconography of propaganda specifically as it relates to the historical development of political ideologies in modern Egypt and how was/is this propaganda disseminated among creative fields such as cinema, art, monuments, architecture, and literature?

Explore the MSc in Nationalism, Ethnic Conflict and Development at Leiden University: study governance and diversity, choose elective seminars, complete a thesis and optionally an internship.

On 17 October 2017 an international conference took place at the University of Warwick Brussels Office and in the framework of the research project

The researchers and students at the Department of Archaeological Heritage and Society at the Faculty of Archaeology study the role of the past in modern societies. They want to find out more about the relationships between the past and the present, and the role that heritage plays.

Cristina Grasseni’s project

How did local lifeways and crafting practices persist and develop in the diverse environments of the increasingly interconnected Gulf of Fonseca (AD 400-1521)?

Abbas provides an in-depth analysis of the complex interplay between Zionism, Jewish identity, power dynamics, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

On Friday 20 September, the first Sector Plan Conference for the theme Cultural Heritage and Identity will be organised in Rotterdam. The conference is intended for all staff and national partners working in the field of Cultural Heritage and Identity. In particular, those involved in the Sector Plan…

Heritage knowledge that offers insight into identity and cultural diversity.

Kyra van der Moezel defended her thesis on 7 September 2016.