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Humanities at Leiden University Leiden’s Faculty of Humanities is an international centre for the study of the world’s languages, cultures and nations. The Faculty’s research stretches from prehistoric times to the present day, and takes a broad perspective that encompasses fields as diverse as religion, philosophy, literature, art and technology.
Multidisciplinary collaboration The Faculty of Humanities is home to a wide range of renowned Dutch and international scholars with expertise in a large number of disciplines, together covering nearly all continents and time periods. Many of the Faculty’s programmes are characterised by a multidisciplinary approach, with researchers sharing their knowledge and insights and thus inspiring and strengthening their teaching and research projects. The Faculty’s research activities are currently structured within six institutes: • The Academy of Creative and Performing Arts (ACPA) focuses on bringing together art and science. • The Leiden University Institute for Area Studies (LIAS) combines thorough knowledge of language and culture with disciplinary approaches from the humanities, social sciences, law, and, at the Leiden University Centre for the Study of Religion (LUCSoR), religious studies. • The Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society (LUCAS) covers the field of literature and literary studies, the history of art and material culture, and film and new media studies. • The Leiden University Institute for History (LUIH) has a broad and wide-reaching academic scope. The Institute has a unique international orientation and focuses on the study of European, American, Asian and African societies in a global context.
• The Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL) brings together the Faculty’s linguistic research. • The Leiden University Institute for Philosophy (LUIPh) studies philosophy in all its facets in relation to the many disciplines taught at the University. The Faculty of Humanities is home to more than 6,000 students. In the 2015-2016 academic year the Faculty offered no fewer than 23 BA and 27 MA programmes, including research master’s programmes. In 2014, the Faculty’s 639 staff members were engaged in teaching and research activities based on a turnover of over 58 million euros. The Faculty awarded PhD degrees to 63 candidates in 2014.
International research The Leiden Faculty of Humanities is ranked among the top universities in the world, and in the 2014-2015 academic year scored 25th in the Times Higher Education Ranking for the subject area Arts and Humanities. The quality of the Faculty’s teaching and research is recognised nationally and internationally, as evidenced in the many grants and prizes awarded to our researchers and students. A remarkable example was the prestigious International Rostrum for Composers award. The award went to Yannis Kyriakides, PhD student at the Academy of Creative and Performing Arts, for his cello, video and electronics piece ‘Words and Song Without Words’.