Are you thinking about studying Religious Studies? Learn more and watch the programme presentation.

The presence of religious idioms in people’s responses to vulnerability and misfortune is not unique to Aceh, or to Indonesia. Yet the scale of the tsunami coupled with the historically deeply ingrained presence of religion in Acehnese everyday life has magnified religious discourses on misfortune,…

The MA Religious Studies at Leiden University is designed to equip students with the tools and knowledge required for studying, interpreting, and analysing religion as a diverse (human) phenomenon. With its world-class scholars and access to exceptional research collections, the programme offers the…

What moves an individual, a society or a culture? How does religion relate to politics, economics and morals? Religion is everywhere and often plays, unnoticed, a large role in the daily lives of yourself and others.

This study investigates and analyses didactical approaches in theory and practice of both scholars and expert teachers in Religious Education/Life World Orientation (for secondary level) in their role as Identity Agents in order to discover and develop didactical key components contributing to religious…

Religions involve belief in the unbelievable: in evil spirits causing disease, in souls surviving death, and in gods punishing wrongdoers and blessing the just. Cognitive studies suggest that humans are predisposed to speculate about fate and divine agency, but support from so-called ‘plausibility structures’…

Jasmijn Rana demonstrates in the article 'Secular-religious self-improvement: Muslim women’s kickboxing in the Netherlands' that young Muslim women who kickbox develop agentive selves by challenging gender norms and living out their religious subjectivities.

The role of religion in the identity construction of LGBTQIA+ folks

Recently, studies have shown the similarities and differences in sources of meaning between religionists, ‘nones’ and atheists (see several studies of Schnell and others). The present study that will be conducted in three European countries tries to clarify the relationship between meaning giving and…

This project receives funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101054849 (PURANA).

This dissertation focuses on a new field of artistic research in which a visual artist takes on the role of researcher. The main research question is whether performance art integrated in an ecumenical service, combined with artistic directions from the artist, can enhance the religious experience of…

Religion and ethnicity are inextricably linked in discourse within and about Central Asia. One common narrative suggests that as a result of differences between historically sedentary and nomadic populations, ethnic Tajiks and Uzbeks are naturally more religious and more likely to radicalise than their…

Khadija Kadrouch-Outmany defended her thesis on 16 September 2014.

Resilient Diversity: the Governance of Racial and Religious Plurality in the Dutch Empire, 1600-1800

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.

Abdessamad El Amraoui defended his thesis on 6 Mai 2015.

Channi Li defended her thesis on 15 October 2019.

Mathilde Mechling defended her thesis on 28 january 2020.

This publication of the School of Advanced Study of the University of London is one of the outcomes of the Landscapes of Early Roman Colonization project and the Colonial Rural Networks project (NWO, Dr. T.D. Stek). The volume, edited by Tesse Stek and prof. Gert-Jan Burgers of the Free University Amsterdam,…

This project aims to revisit the ways in which religious minorities in the Middle East participated in, contributed to, and opposed the Arab nationalism of the post-war years, when the British and French ruled the region via the Mandates. Research question: How did religious minorities in the Middle…

Latif Fauzi defended his thesis on 18 May 2021.

How has interreligious encounter in Ogbómòsó created multiple religious belongings and identities among individuals and groups?

This project investigates how the first generation of Dutch printed books (the incunabula, 1473-1501) affected late medieval spirituality, religious practice and visual culture in the Low Countries.

They might not have had Twitter, but they did have brochures (pamphlets), the Roman Catholics and ‘modern’ Protestants between 1840 and 1870. In these, they launched a passionate attack on each other’s ideas. Ineke Smit has catalogued the brochures from the collection of the University Library and outlined…

Mr. Sujadi defended his thesis on 29 June 2017

On Monday 13 September, the Food Citizens? team and the Religious Matters In an Entangled World team from Utrecht University met in Leiden University’s historic 12th century building, Gravensteen.

Markus Altena Davidsen and colleagues Michaël van der Meer, Maurits Berger and Kim Beerden received a subsidy from the KNAW-Pilotfund. They will use the 10.000 € for an inspiration book for teachers religion/worldview.

Jessica Barr and Barbara Zimbalist invite essays that examine any aspect of race and religion in medieval culture and society for a special issue on race and religion in the Middle Ages. Deadline for submission: 1 February 2021.

The chief aim of this study is to explore how classical Persian poetry and the Persian mysticism that is interwoven with the poetry have been used in the new politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran, especially during the Iran-Iraq war.

There is a crisis in the law concerning the accommodation of religious practice. The legal profession is demanding that the law be changed because it does not want religious institutions to have the 'right to discriminate'. The profession holds that evolving societal sexual norms can render lawful religious…

On January 19, a masterclass on the theme of religious imagination will take place in the Lorentz Center in Leiden. This masterclass for MA and PhD students will focus on the religious imagination as a spiritual skill in the late medieval Low Countries, and the role of religious texts, images, and objects…

Religions involve belief in the unbelievable: in evil spirits causing disease, in souls surviving death, and in gods punishing wrongdoers and blessing the just. Cognitive studies suggest that humans are predisposed to speculate about fate and divine agency, but support from so-called ‘plausibility structures’…

The bachelor program Religious Studies has, besides also Linguistics and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, been awarded by the 'Keuzevakkengids Universiteiten 2019' with the predicate top program.

It is becoming increasingly common for large Dutch municipalities, including the Municipality of Amsterdam, to allow special enforcement officers to wear religious symbols such as the kippah and headscarf. Dutch Minister of Justice Dilan Yesilgöz and PVV party leader Geert Wilders are opposed to this…

Leiden’s Religious Studies ranks 40th place in the QS World University Rankings by Subject.

When is (or becomes) an out-of-body experience a R/S experience? (How) do people make sense of their experiences and is this related to mental health? Which motives do people have to (not) communicate their out-of-body experiences with regular and/or alternative caregivers? And what does it tell us…

Linda Stuckrath Gottschalk defended her thesis on 6 April 2016.

Jifeng Liu defended his thesis on 2 February 2017

This project will lead to a critical edition and annotated translation of the Niśvāsamukha, the opening book of the Niśvāsatattvasaṃhitā.