This programme video is presented in Dutch

Taal als sleutel tot het begrijpen van de mens.

Four scientists from Leiden University have each been awarded a Starting Grant by the European Research Council (ERC). This grant, worth up to two million euros, gives researchers the opportunity to head up a research team for five years.

Study information

Below you will find an overview of all PRE-Classes provided by the various programmes of Leiden University. For each section, you can find a description of the content and more specific information about the requirements for participation in the Class.

Besides being a linguist, George Saad is also a photography fanatic. He shares his most beautiful and telling pictures, shot during his field research in Eastern Indonesia.

Tim Koopmans is one of the great minds in the history of Dutch and European legal scholarship. He taught law as a professor in Leiden and other universities, among which Ghent, Cambridge, Utrecht. He practiced it as a judge in the European Court of Justice and Advocate-General in the Dutch Supreme Court,…

When we hear the word ‘bird house’, do we process it as a whole or does our brain see it as ‘bird’ and ‘house’? PhD student Jiaqi Wang explored this for speakers of Mandarin Chinese.

On the 26th of February, Joane de Lima Santiago successfully defended her doctoral thesis and graduated. The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics congratulates Joane on this achievement.

NWO has awarded eleven Leiden researchers a Vidi grant of 800,000 euros. The research subjects range from Cicero and muscle dystrophy to the archaeology of bogs.

Since November 2019 Stephan Raaijmakers is Professor by special appointment of Communicative AI (Artificial Intelligence) at LUCL. Raaijmakers investigates how linguistics can help make Artificial Intelligence smarter.

The Private International Law department offers several courses in the bachelor-, master- and advanced master programs.

Het is een wijdverbreid idee dat (post-)middeleeuwse steden een sterfteoverschot hadden en zij slechts in leven konden blijven door de toestroom van migranten; een fenomeen dat bekend staat als het ‘urban graveyard’-effect. Over details valt te twisten, maar duidelijk is dat de stad en de dood dichter…

The Department of Civil Law teaches and conducts research in the field of civil law. It is responsible for the master’s degree programme Civiel Recht (Civil Law LL.M.) which attracts many students each year from Leiden and elsewhere.

Mr. J. Sun defended his thesis on 21 March 2018.

The Erasmus+ programme supports both incoming and outgoing staff mobilities within Europe, either for training or for teaching. On this webpage some participants of the programme share their experiences.

Below are some of the scholarly works published within the context of the Institutions for Conflict Resolution programme.

Leids onderzoek naar bestraffing komt tot stand uit verschillende disciplines. Het onderzoeksproject kent een juridische, criminologische, sociaalwetenschappelijke en filosofische invalshoek.

Dutch Studies is a unique bachelor’s programme in which you will quickly acquire fluency in spoken and written Dutch at a high academic level, while also gaining a deep understanding of the culture and history of the Netherlands.

A love of puzzles and the patience of a saint: these are two essential traits for linguists wishing to explore the Indo-European language family. Fortunately, Professor Michaël Peyrot possesses both. In his inaugural lecture he will take the audience on a voyage of discovery to the past.

ELS lab member Helen Pluut concluded this year’s lecture series on Empirical Methods in Legal Research. Helen discussed diary studies as an example of multilevel research designs.

AI has huge societal and economic potential and is widely used. But it also brings challenges: how do we combine human values with AI, how do we make AI more transparent and understandable, and what can AI and human cognition learn from each other, for example about language learning?

Research shows that including administrative fines in the screening process for a Certificate of Conduct (in Dutch: VOG) is not currently feasible.

Er is een nijpend cellen- en personeelstekort in Nederlandse gevangenissen. En dit is niet voor de eerste keer. Miranda Boone, hoogleraar criminologie en vergelijkende penologie, sprak met Trouw over de problematiek: ‘Het aantal gevangenen is het resultaat van beleid.’

The Humanities Faculty bachelor’s degree programmes in History, and Greek and Latin language and culture were rated by students as the best. The master’s programmes in Classics and Ancient Civilisations, Dutch Studies and North American Studies also received the highest scores. These were the results…

Extensive research is being conducted at the Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology on developments in sentencing and punitive measures and how judges and other actors in the criminal justice system reach decisions. Another focus area is how punishments and measures are implemented and the effect…

The Institute for Philosophy has a new Academic Director: on 1 February, James McAllister was succeeded by Douglas Berger. We asked him about his plans.

No fewer than three Leiden University Humanities scholars have been awarded funding from the NWO’s Free Competition in the Humanities programme: two grants of 750,000 euros and one of 705,000 euros. In total, twelve researchers have received a grant in the NWO Social Sciences and Humanities domain.

In welke mate hebben domaniale structuren de machtsvorming en nederzettingsontwikkeling in en van het gewest Holland bepaald?

The university is home to many pearls of research institutes that do not make the news every day. The Executive Board visited one such pearl, the Institute of Philosophy, on Tuesday 1 July. It resulted in an inspired conversation.

More focus on diversity in Antiquity, workshops for students with disabilities, and a card game to share stories about diversity: these and other projects will receive funding from the JEDI Fund in 2023.

Op maandag 1 april 2024 stierf onze leermeester, vriend en gewaardeerd collega Dr. Alexander Hendrik de Groot (Sander).

The BLRN members have published extensively in recent years. In addition to the BLRN book series, dissertations of BLRN members published in the E.M. Meijers Institute Series, you will find below a selection of our publications. For a more complete overview of publications of each BLRN member, please…