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Karwan Fatah-Black, a historian at Leiden University’s Faculty of Humanities and senior researcher at the KITLV/Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies, has been appointed as the UNESCO Chair holder in Comparative History of Slavery and the Transition to Citizenship.

Clarinetist and ACPA researcher Michael Drapkin recently received an Eastman School of Music Paul R. Judy Center for Innovation and Research Grant for his project

It is still not easy to ‘come out’ about your sexual orientation or gender identity. On Coming Out Day (11 October), the issue was the focus of global attention. This year, instead of the traditional rainbow flag, the ‘progress pride flag’ flew above University buildings.

Space for open dialogue on historical slavery was created at the Keti Koti Table at Museum De Lakenhal, organised by Leiden University and the Municipality of Leiden. There, just metres away from 17th-century paintings, Leideners shared a ritual meal and spoke about the effects of slavery and our colonial…

Research into our history of colonialism and slavery, heart-to-heart conversations at a Keti Koti table, exhibitions, lectures and podcasts that establish the link between present and past. Staff and students participated in the national Slavery Memorial Year in many different ways. What have we learned…

Professor of Law and Society Maartje van der Woude is searching for innovative ways to facilitate dialogue about topics that are usually experienced as ‘difficult to talk about’ – such as racism, ethnic profiling, exclusion, crimmigration – with a wide audience.

Leiden University actively promotes diversity and inclusion. In the online magazine Diversity and Inclusion you can read all about the symposium, the exhibition and what the University is doing to make sure that all students and staff feel welcome at our University.

Jasmina Mačkić, assistant professor at the Europa Institute, presented her research during ‘The Dissident’, a live talk show which is organised regularly by World-Talks, on 24th May 2018. The event revolved around the Nigerian human rights defender Justus Ijeoma, the founder of the International Human…

Leiden University kicked off the first PhD Symposium ‘Institutions for Conflict Resolution’ (COI). COI is a nation-wide partnership that serves to implement the Dutch Legal Sector Plan (2019 – 2024). This partnership aims to preserve the authority and legitimacy of government institutions and the judiciary,…

Other COI publications can be found on Leiden Law Blog, the Leiden Law Methods Portal, and in the drop-down tabs below.

The Faculty of Humanities has two advisory groups for Diversty & Inclusion: one for staff members and one for students.

How can we make Sinterklaas inclusive as a national holiday? And what does this mean for our University community and Dutch society as a whole? These questions were the focus of the first edition of ‘Come Talk to Us’, a series of online dialogues organised by the Diversity & Inclusion Expertise Office…

Professor Judi Mesman interviewed 40 people of colour in leadership positions. What can we learn from them?

This February, Leiden University honors two scholars who have responded to the challenges of modern society in important, innovative and exemplary ways. Catherine Malabou and Safiya Umoja Noble will receive honorary doctorates for their ground breaking research in philosophy and internet/media studies…

Nikki Sterkenburg, external PhD candidate at the Institute of Security and Global Affairs in The Hague, was interviewed by the NOS programme Nieuws & Co about the meeting of Thierry Baudet with Alt-Right movement Jared Taylor. 'If Baudet would have wished to stay aloof of this movement, he shouldn’t…

Milou Deelen, a feminist and journalist in her early twenties, will start her lecture with the video she produced herself on slut shaming This video marked the start of her feminist struggle. Deelen's talk cites Instagram as an important medium to spread the feminist message.

Globalization, migration, technological innovation and climate change pose challenges to citizens in European countries. These challenges test the limits of cross-national and cross-generational solidarities, touching upon the very foundations of governance and society. This research program aims at…

The main aim of this project is to reveal and unravel the invisible histories of the UN, transcending the dominant Western perspective to recover the historical agency of Global South actors. The research will investigate how the UN has both facilitated and limited their role in shaping global order…

Book Presentation | Studium Generale Lecture

Black Theatre, activist theatre by and for black South Africans, flourished under apartheid. However, according to Francis Rangoajane, the democratisation of South Africa has in no way diminished the importance of this art form. PhD defence 16 November.

On 7 October, a court in Athens, Greece, convicted leaders of the far-right Golden Dawn party as directing a criminal organization. Marina Terkourafi, professor of Sociolinguistics, discusses the landmark ruling for the Leiden International Studies Blog.

How can we best tell the current generations about some of the darkest parts of our past? To answer this question, researchers from Leiden are working with the Gedeeld Verleden, Gezamenlijke Toekomst foundation on public programmes about the Dutch history of slavery.

Amid rising polarisation and discrimination, lawyer and human rights activist Lilian Gonçalves-Ho Kang You wants to show in her Cleveringa Lecture on 26 November how dangerous exclusion is.

There is too much focus on online radicalisation, says Joe Whittaker, when this is just one of the factors that make someone become a terrorist. In fact, Whittaker’s research shows that terrorists who use the internet are less successful in achieving their goal than those who stay offline. He will defend…

Leiden University will award two honorary doctorates at its Dies Natalis on 9 February 2026. They will go to internet studies scholar Safiya Umoja Noble and philosopher Catherine Malabou.

Lawyer and human rights activist Lilian Gonçalves-Ho Kang You is the new Cleveringa professor.

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.’

Nadia Bouras will give the Annie Romein-Verschoor Lecture on 6 March. She will call for academic freedom for everyone.

Leiden University has had a diversity policy since 2014. The aim is to create a diverse and inclusive learning and working environment for all students and staff. Diversity Officer Aya Ezawa updates us on the process and the results. It’s now 2022, what has already changed?

She stands out for the moderate tone she takes in discussions on Dutch talk shows. Without judgement you can have an open conversation, criminal lawyer Natacha Harlequin learned in her student days in Leiden. ‘What I personally think of the alleged act doesn’t matter so much.’

Cleveringa Professor Roméo Dallaire led the UN peacekeeping mission in Rwanda in 1994, but was unable to prevent a genocide from unfolding before his very eyes. Eight hundred thousand people lost their lives. In his Cleveringa Lecture on 26 November, this retired Lieutenant-General from Canada speaks…

History of Inequality and Power provides you with an in-depth understanding of the past and present that will contribute to solving current societal problems.

‘A Muslim and a Jew in the house of God.’ This is how historian Nadia Bouras introduced her recent conversation with colleague Sara Polak in Leiden’s Hooglandse Kerk. They discussed the rising tensions since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. ‘Dare to ask each other questions.’

The Mapping Slavery project will place markers that tell the story of Leiden’s slavery past. Why is this important and what does it mean for today’s society? Before the markers are placed, a panel came together on 24 March to discuss the slavery past of not only the city but the University too.

Ijeoma Uchegbu is Professor of Pharmacy at University College London (UCL). As a female scientist of colour, she was initially reluctant to play an active role in the university’s diversity policy. Until, that is, she had a radical change of heart: ‘I knew it; I had to become an evangelist.'

What is the significance of the history of slavery for our present-day society? A special exhibition in the inner courtyard of the Academy Building features eleven insightful portraits of students and staff, and their answer to this question. The aim of the exhibition’s initiators is to make the subject…

UNESCO has recognized a large collection of handwritten letters and the archive of Raden Ajeng Kartini (1879-1904) as documentary world heritage. Kartini opposed gender inequality in feudal Javanese society, including forced marriages, polygamy and lack of education for women.

I was disgusted by the recent Ongehoord Nederland broadcast on 15 September. The racist and hateful comments made by alumna Raisa Blommesteijn were, as far as I am concerned, way over the line and in my opinion also violate Article 1 of the Constitution of the Netherlands.

Psychiatrists in Morocco can't ignore Islam. Driss Moussaoui was one of the first modern psychiatrists in this North African country. He delivered the LUCIS annual lecture on 12 April.

The new Humanities Hub in the Huizinga Building was officially opened on Tuesday 3 December. In the different labs, researchers presented the options for using digital technologies in humanities research.

Thousands of first-year students and hundreds of mentors kicked off the EL CID on Monday morning. This year for the first time, the introduction week of Leiden University and Leiden University of Applied Sciences was also open for students of Regional Training Centre mboRijnland and the Leiden Instrument…

Master’s students in the Honours Class ‘Leiden, City of Refugees?’ were asked to contemplate the concept of ‘the other’ from both an academic and an artistic perspective. The result was the exhibition ‘The Invitation’ which was presented at Stadsbauhaus on 4 June.

Due to its success, the Leiden2022 Q&A has been extended and is looking for even more thought-provoking, interesting or unusual questions.

Many traces of the city's slavery history can be found in Leiden but the public isn't always aware of them. The initiators of 'Mapping Slavery in Leiden' want to change this with guided tours and street markers. Representatives of the University and other Leiden institutions will be giving the first…

During last summer, the Faculty of Law offered an Honours Class about the theme 'Governing Crime and Migration'. Hillary Mellinger, one of the participating international students, tells us about her experiences.

Leiden University is under fire: it is allegedly doing too little to tackle antisemitism. Rector Hester Bijl responds to this accusation and to a video from 2014 on social media in which extreme remarks are made. ‘We can be short about such comments: they are unacceptable. The university is and always…

Author and political scientist Mounir Samuel has spent recent years delving into the many ways that language can exclude people and bring them together.

How tolerant is the Netherlands on the work floor? Jojanneke van der Toorn, Professor of the Workplace Pride Chair, the first in the world dealing exclusively with LGBT inclusion in the workplace, answers questions on the International Day against Racism and Discrimination.