The major objective of the study is to ascertain how Japanese colonialism affected the manner in which food was produced, processed, prepared and consumed in the colony, and how new attitudes towards these practices were constructed.

This project investigates the effects of the Asia-Pacific War (1931-1945) and the Korean War (1950-1953) on the production, distribution, preparation and consumption of food in transwar Japan and Korea.

Andrea Giolai defended his thesis on 3 May 2017.

“Winner CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award 2016” A Cultural History

This thesis investigates the historical development of Japanese pitch accent.

We offer General Language Courses, Summer Courses and Custom-made language training and In-company training.

The aim of this research was to establish if Ebeling's semiotactic theory and method of semiotactic analysis, as described in his works Syntax and Semantics (1978), Een Inleiding tot de Syntaxis (1994) and Semiotaxis, over Theoretische en Nederlandse Syntaxis (2006), could be applied to Modern Japanese…

Mari Nakamura defended her thesis on 14 March 2017

Since the disaster in Japan, professors, staff and students of the department of Japanese Language and Culture at Leiden University have regularly been contacted by the media asking for their opinion about the events taking place there. Ivo Smits and Kasia Cwiertka, Professors of Japanese, give their…

This thesis investigates the processing of words written in Japanese kanji and Chinese hànzì, i.e. logographic scripts.

LIAS aims to advance the globally conscious vision of area studies, both within and outside the academic community. Focusing on Asia and the Middle East, the institute is a meeting place of multiple fields of inquiry, theories and methods, historical periods, and areas.

This book project explores the changing dynamics of marriage and family life in postwar Japan based on an examination of the life histories of single mothers.

Lecture

This study elucidates a critical facet of modern global Buddhism that has escaped the attention of the scholarly community by exploring the life, teachings and influence of Master Wuguang 悟光上師 (1918-2000).

The Archaeology of Imperial Landscapes examines the transformation of rural landscapes and societies that formed the backbone of ancient empires in the Near East and Mediterranean. Through a comparative approach to archaeological data, it analyses the patterns of transformation in widely differing imperial…

In the Bachelor's programme Japanese Studies at Leiden University you will study the rich history and age-old traditions of Japan. Discover the fascinating country of haiku, samurai, geishas and manga.

This dissertation explores how domestic political power struggles in Greece and Turkey during the Cold War engaged with the ongoing conflict in Cyprus and aims to demonstrate how socialist parties in Greece and Turkey struggled with the concept of the “nation” in battling for power and political positioning…

Leiden University’s internationally-respected master’s in Japanese Studies offers specialised knowledge on the most important aspects of modern and pre-modern Japan.

Japanese was not always the language spoken in Japan. Researchers link the arrival of the language in Japan with the migration of farmers around 400 BC. Linguist Elisabeth de Boer has been awarded an ERC Starting Grant to carry out research on the further spread of the language in Japan.

For more than 1500 years, Confucianism has played a major role in shaping Japan's history - from the formation of the first Japanese states during the first millennium AD, to Japan's modernization in the nineteenth century, to World War II and its still unresolved legacies across East Asia today.

Ruobin Han defended her thesis on 21 March 2017

Japan's Occupation of Java in the Second World War draws upon written and oral Japanese, Indonesian, Dutch and English-language sources to narrate the Japanese occupation of Java as a transnational intersection between two complex Asian societies, placing this narrative in a larger wartime context of…

Nichiran kankei-shi o yomitoku [Revisiting the History of Dutch-Japanese Relations] is a new, two-volume Japanese publication with a chapter written by Wulan Remmelink. Both volumes offer a new look on the historical relations between Japan and The Netherlands during the Edo period by examining various…

Conference

Thomas Mes defended his thesis on 9 January 2018.

Beyond Empires explores the complexity of empire building from the point of view of self-organized networks, rather than from the point of view of the central state.

Lecture, Contemporary History and International Relations Research Seminar