Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (HCAS)

23/10/2026

The Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies is happy to invite applications for a one-year fellowship beginning in August 2027. The HCAS-RJ Fellowship Program, funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, is aimed at mid-career researchers in the humanities and social sciences who are affiliated with a university in Sweden.

The application deadline is November 30, 2026. Apply now: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-collegium-advanced-studies/apply/apply-hcas-rj-fellowship

22/10/2026

History and politics are full of unholy alliances.

British socialists and conservatives finding common ground in Euroscepticism. Eastern European anti-communist dissidents opposing European integration. Left-wing intellectuals supporting Viktor Orbán’s far-right politics.

Such strange bedfellows appear across historical, political, and disciplinary contexts.

The HCAS Workshop “Unholy Alliances: Reframing European History and Politics” brings together scholars from anthropology, history, political science, and related fields. Together, we will explore alliances in European history and politics deemed unholy, unlikely, and, for some, unwelcome.

November 12–13, 2026 at HCAS. Registration is now open: https://blogs.helsinki.fi/unholy-alliances/

19/10/2026

Who or what should be remembered and why?

Professor Anne McCants (MIT) explores the connection between memory and human dignity in her public lecture at the University of Helsinki on November 5, 2026.

From the Amsterdam Municipal Orphanage to the Dutch East India Company refreshment station at Cape Town, South Africa, the talk showcases how the pervasive desire for dignity has manifested itself in the past.

See details: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-collegium-advanced-studies/news/public-lecture-erkko-professor-anne-mccants-memory-human-dignity-and-practice-history

14/10/2026

This week, Team HCAS attended the annual meeting of Netias, the European Network of Institutes for Advanced Study, hosted beautifully by Iméra IAS in Marseille.

Stimulating encounters with dear colleagues, plans for future collaborations, and plenty of food for body and soul. The local context also made itself felt rather literally: tear gas from student demonstrations drifted into the otherwise idyllic garden of the Iméra Institute, giving conference delegates an unexpected sensory experience.

12/10/2026

Docent Susanne Dahlgren and Professor Elisabeth Lund Engebretsen are the HCAS Alumni of the Month for October 2026.

Susanne Dahlgren’s time spent at HCAS broadened her research perspectives and supported her international work. As an anthropologist, she learned to challenge concepts in conversation with philosophers, communicate her research clearly to legal scholars, and traveled to Yemen to study Islamic law.

Elisabeth Lund Engebretsen was already working across disciplines before joining the Collegium. At HCAS, she found a community that fostered interdisciplinary exchange among researchers from different fields, countries, and career stages. Many of the relationships she built in this environment have lasted to this day.

Read the full stories: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-collegium-advanced-studies/news/alumni-month-susanne-dahlgren-and-elisabeth-lund-engebretsen

05/10/2026

Finnish forests are brimming with mushrooms, so it was about time we headed into the woods for HCAS’s annual mushroom hunting trip.

Before setting off, our group of nearly 30 fellows and family members first learned to distinguish common Finnish mushrooms from one another. With the guidance of seasoned foragers Anna Nyman and Sanna Autere, we took home basketfuls of trumpet chanterelles, wood hedgehogs, sheep polypore, and more.

23/09/2026

Our honorary fellow Martha C. Nussbaum has been awarded the prestigious Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity.

The Helsinki Collegium warmly congratulates Prof. Nussbaum on this remarkable achievement!

Library of Congress to Award Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity to Philosopher Martha C. Nussbaum The Library of Congress announced today that philosopher Martha C. Nussbaum will...

11/09/2026

What is happiness, and should it be measured? Why does Finland repeatedly emerge as the happiest country in the world?

HCAS researchers Acer Chang, Amanda Lagerkvist, Rob Boddice, Satu Venäläinen, and Kristina Jacobsen approach the World Happiness Report from different disciplinary perspectives in a new Freedom to Think! blog text. The dialogue exposes some methodological and conceptual assumptions behind the report and highlights the fundamentally political nature of measuring and ranking happiness.

The Happiness Report may be useful for branding a country, but what does it actually tell us about how things are?

Link to the full blog post is in the comments.

10/09/2026

The academic year has barely begun, and our fellows are already active on multiple fronts.

• Uğur Aslan’s new sound piece premiered at Siirtymä Ambient Festival.
• Timo Miettinen’s essay on the relationship between climate change and democracy was published on Helsingin Sanomat.
• Christian Laes wrote the preface to the new book by Orazio Antonio Bologna, one of today’s most prominent Latin Writers.
• Rob Boddice was interviewed about the history of emotions for the German magazine Chrismon.

We are thrilled about the good news and look forward to sharing future updates from our fellows.

Links to everything mentioned are in the comments.

09/09/2026

”The Collegium provided something that is increasingly rare in academic life: time and freedom to think, combined with constant intellectual exchange.”

For Professor William Van Andringa (École Pratique des Hautes Études), his time at the Collegium was much more than a period during which to finish a research project. It changed the questions he is asking of archaeology itself.

Read more in the HCAS Alumni Gallery: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/helsinki-collegium-advanced-studies/news/september-2026-stephen-gill-and-william-van-andringa