International Institute for Asian Studies

International Institute for Asian Studies The International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) is a research and exchange platform based in the university city of Leiden, the Netherlands

IIAS hosts a range of visiting fellows who benefit from one of the world’s largest
concentration of scholars and collections on Asia. IIAS addresses current and long term historical trends through its three research clusters: Global Asia, Asian Cities and Asian Heritages. IIAS encourages the multi-disciplinary and comparative study of Asia and promotes national and international cooperation, thus

linking the expertise of scholars and practitioners. It acts as an interface between academic and non-academic partners including cultural, social and policy organisations. IIAS offers a unique range of communication instruments enabling it to reach out to thousands of academics and professionals worldwide. The Newsletter enjoys a global audience of 13,000 subscribers. It features research, thematic articles, reviews, photo essays, announcements and institutional news.

🎬 IIAS Friday Film Screenings showcase community building among our fellows, who are encouraged to organize activities t...
07/02/2025

🎬 IIAS Friday Film Screenings showcase community building among our fellows, who are encouraged to organize activities that foster meaningful dialogue with their peers.

🎬 These engaging films spark dynamic discussions on important social issues, creating an inspiring space for interdisciplinary collaboration and exchange.

Current Fellows Ling Zhang and Sarah Niazi reflect:

💬 "Upon connecting with our cohort at IIAS and discovering our shared passion for cinema, we enthusiastically proposed the organisation of the IIAS Friday Film screenings. In this initiative, fellows take turns to introduce films that reflects their research interests and disciplinary backgrounds. The selected films span a wide spectrum of genres, styles, and themes, ranging from fiction to essay films and documentaries, originating from Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. The subject matter of the films curated are equally varied, addressing pressing issues such as gender and racial equality, migration, social justice, or workers’ rights. As a result, the post-screening discussions are intellectually stimulating, drawing not only fellows but also Leiden university students and scholars from beyond IIAS. Discussions often spark passionate debates, with participants exchanging differing perspectives in an atmosphere that remains open-minded and collegial. The IIAS Friday Film Sessions serve as a catalyst for interdisciplinary and transregional dialogues, aligning seamlessly with the broader agenda of the IIAS. This initiative also encourages fellows to engage with contemporary audiovisual media in their research, reinforcing public engagement and enhancing the social relevance of their scholarly work.” 💬

🔸This upcoming March, IIAS Fellow My Hang Thi Bui will be teaching a remote postgraduate mini-course on "Inter-Asian Int...
06/02/2025

🔸This upcoming March, IIAS Fellow My Hang Thi Bui will be teaching a remote postgraduate mini-course on "Inter-Asian Intimacies: Southeast Asian Marriage Migration to East Asia."

🔸This course hosted by GETSEA: A Consortium of Centers for Southeast Asian Studies which is supported by Cornell University.

🔸My Hang has been awarded a twelve-month IIAS Fellowship to participate in the IIAS Fellowship Programme in Leiden from September 2024 until August 2025. Her research project is titled The Twinning of the East: South Korea-Vietnam Sister Cities.

🔗 Find out more about her research at https://www.iias.asia/profile/my-hang-thi-bui

🔗 For the full syllabus & details, please visit: https://get-sea.org/mini-courses

⚠️The application deadline is February 24

⏰Virtual Course Dates: March 25 - April 29

🎙️ Have you listened to episode #45 of The Channel? ‘Islam and Politics in Indonesia with Verena Meyer, Zainal Abidin, ...
04/02/2025

🎙️ Have you listened to episode #45 of The Channel? ‘Islam and Politics in Indonesia with Verena Meyer, Zainal Abidin, Saskia Schäfer, and Taufiq Hanafi’🎙️

🔹 This podcast features a conversation about contemporary Indonesian politics, with a special focus on the role of Islam.

🔹This episode is hosted by Dr. Verena Meyer, an Assistant Professor of Islam in South and Southeast Asia at Leiden University. She is joined by three colleagues with expertise in Islam and politics in contemporary Indonesia.

🔗 For more information about the episode, its participants, and to listen click https://www.iias.asia/the-channel/islam-and-politics-indonesia

➡️ For more The Channel episodes, visit: https://www.iias.asia/the-channel



[📷 Stamp of Indonesia, 2006. Wikipedia Commons]

⚠️REMINDER: Application deadline approaching- 15 February 2025⚠️ 🔸IIAS invites applications for the Chair of Taiwan Stud...
04/02/2025

⚠️REMINDER: Application deadline approaching- 15 February 2025⚠️

🔸IIAS invites applications for the Chair of Taiwan Studies at Leiden University and the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS).

🔸The Chair offers a five-month Professorial Fellowship for a visiting scholar specialising in Taiwan Studies, who will teach and conduct research at Leiden University and IIAS in the first semester of the 2025-2026 academic year.



➡️ apply here: https://mailchi.mp/iias/chair-taiwan-studies-2526

Did you know❓In addition to its prolific output for The Newsletter, The Blogpost, The Channel, or the Fellowship Program...
03/02/2025

Did you know❓

In addition to its prolific output for The Newsletter, The Blogpost, The Channel, or the Fellowship Programme: IIAS bolsters and engages in various interdisciplinary and collaborative Networks.

🌎 These initiatives are based all around the world, engaging with local institutions and communities. This rich web makes IIAS a global actor, committed to evolve and grow with the ever-changing landscape of Asian Studies 🌏

➡️ Find out more about our Networks at https://www.iias.asia/networks

[IIAS] The Update | Feb 2025 - https://mailchi.mp/iias/iias-the-update-feb2025-correction Discover our new (online) even...
31/01/2025

[IIAS] The Update | Feb 2025 - https://mailchi.mp/iias/iias-the-update-feb2025-correction Discover our new (online) events, podcasts and books, meet our new fellows and visiting scholars. Until February 7, you can apply to participate in a unique ‘in-situ engagement project’ and until Feb 15 for the Chair of Taiwan Studies. Early-bird registration fees for the Africa-Asia3 ConFest apply until March 1.

🎉 IIAS is celebrating a major milestone of The Newsletter. On April 15th, the publication will release the 100th issue! ...
30/01/2025

🎉 IIAS is celebrating a major milestone of The Newsletter. On April 15th, the publication will release the 100th issue! 🎉

📚 For over 30 years, this flagship publication of the International Institute for Asian Studies has been a vital forum for Asia scholars worldwide. With a global readership of 50,000, The Newsletter brings you articles on current research, contemporary politics, artistic practices, pedagogical experimentation, and so much more on events and projects in Asian Studies, for free!
Join us as we mark this milestone and continue fostering knowledge and connections across academia and beyond.

➡️ Subscribe to our mailing list and receive a physical copy! Fill out the form at: https://iias.us17.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=5bda00a9569229289e9e2cd5c&id=e20ff6c969

➡️ Do you prefer the online version of The Newsletter? Click here to access all issues on our website: https://www.iias.asia/the-newsletter

💧This is a friendly reminder about our River Cities Network upcoming presentation series- 'Regenerating the Ngong River:...
29/01/2025

💧This is a friendly reminder about our River Cities Network upcoming presentation series- 'Regenerating the Ngong River: A Journey of Riparian Planning, Renewal, and Transformation.'

💧This online event is free to attend, the zoom link is accessible through this link: https://www.rivercities.world/events/regenerating-ngong-river-presentation

⏰ February 4, 14:00 CET

💧 This session promises to offer valuable insights, especially for those considering applying to the In-Situ Engagement Project (ISEP) happening in Nairobi this September. For more information about this ISEP, please visit https://www.iias.asia/events/regenerating-ngong-river

⚠️ The deadline for applications is Friday 7 February 2025.

📍 This project will take place in Nairobi, Kenya

⏰ The in-situ event will take place from 7-14 September 2025

🐍 IIAS is wishing a Happy Lunar New Year to all those who celebrate! May this Year of the Snake bring growth, wisdom, an...
29/01/2025

🐍 IIAS is wishing a Happy Lunar New Year to all those who celebrate! May this Year of the Snake bring growth, wisdom, and prosperity 🐍



[image: A woman touches the snake figure on the stone wall ahead of the Chinese Lunar New Year of the Snake. Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved]

🌍🌏 Africa-Asia: A New Axis of Knowledge – 3rd Edition 11-14 June, Dakar, Senegal We’ve received an overwhelming number o...
28/01/2025

🌍🌏 Africa-Asia: A New Axis of Knowledge – 3rd Edition
11-14 June, Dakar, Senegal

We’ve received an overwhelming number of proposals for the third edition of Africa-Asia: A New Axis of Knowledge, reaffirming the importance and urgency of this space for inclusive debate and collaboration, with knowledge actors and local communities from the Global South.

The submissions cover a wide spectrum of topics, deepening discussions on shared histories and connections between African and Asian contexts. They also expand their scope to encompass Latin America, exploring the dynamic triangulations and intersections between these three regions.

Key themes to be explored include:

📌 The future of the Sahel region
📌 The disconnect between agriculture and health in Afro-Asian contexts
📌 The Bandung Spirit and its legacy in contemporary diplomacy
📌 African art in Chinese museums and Asian art in African museums
📌 Islamophobia and its transformations over time and space
📌 Maritime narratives and the South Atlantic escape routes
📌 The colonial legacy of lion hunting in West Africa and India
📌 Creolization processes in the Indian Ocean
📌 The role of open science and open access publications in strengthening South-South dialogue

And this is just the beginning! The event promises to bring forward critical reflections and foster collaborations to better understand and reimagine global connections.

📅 Date: 11–14 June
📍 Location: Dakar
Presentations in English, French and Portuguese.

🌐 Learn more and stay updated on our website: https://www.iias.asia/event/africa-asia-new-axis-knowledge-third-edition

🤝 Organised by: , , and , with the support of

We’re looking forward to these transformative discussions and to strengthening ties between Africa, Asia, and beyond!

For queries about the event: [email protected]

📚 New Book publication! Global Asia: ‘South Asia on the Move. Mobilities, Mobilizations, Maneuvers’, edited by Benjamin ...
28/01/2025

📚 New Book publication! Global Asia: ‘South Asia on the Move. Mobilities, Mobilizations, Maneuvers’, edited by Benjamin Linder and Tarini Bedi

🔸This book sustains and expands the new mobilities paradigm by focusing such theoretical advances on South Asian scholarship.

🔸Through a diverse set of interdisciplinary chapters, South Asia on the Move makes a sustained argument about the value of decentering (im)mobilities research. In so doing, the collection redirects the regional, theoretical, and methodological foci of the mobilities turn, demonstrating the relevance of South Asia for thinking about varieties of movement within the region and around the world.

➡️ Find out more about the book and its editors at https://www.iias.asia/books/south-asia-move-mobilities-mobilizations-maneuvers

➡️Discover the other various publications IIAS has to offer at https://www.iias.asia/books

🔹 IIAS is hosting a hybrid (lunch lecture) as part of the Urban Asia Presentation Series: “The Century of (Dis)connectio...
24/01/2025

🔹 IIAS is hosting a hybrid (lunch lecture) as part of the Urban Asia Presentation Series: “The Century of (Dis)connection: The Grand Canal and Spatial Transformation in Northern Jiangsu, 1850-1950.”

🔹 Historical developments can significantly influence current realities. In this lecture, Mingran Cao explores how the decline of China's Grand Canal and coastal transformations in northern Jiangsu Province shifted the region from salt production to cotton cultivation. This analysis uncovers the paradox of growing global integration alongside persistent local (dis)connections in 19th and 20th-century China.

🔹 Mingran Cao is a PhD candidate at Leiden University's Institute for Area Studies. He obtained his MPhil in Political Thought and Intellectual History at Cambridge University and his BA in International Affairs and Political Science from George Washington University and the London School of Economics.

⏰ February 6: 12:30 ~14:00 CET

📍Online / and in-person in the IIAS Conference Room (0.28) Witte Singel 27A 2311 BG Leiden, Netherlands

⚠️ Everyone can attend, online or in person. We will serve lunch for in-person attendees who register at least 2 days in advance. Registration is also required to obtain the Zoom link for online attendance.

🔗 For more information about the event and details, visit https://www.iias.asia/events/century-disconnection-grand-canal-and-spatial-transformation-northern-jiangsu-1850-1950



[image: Map of Jiangsu with coastal cotton plantations superimposed. Qixiang Tan, Map of Jiangsu (1820), in zhongguo lishi dituji dibace qing shiqi (The Historical Atlas of China Volume 8 Qing Period), (Beijing: zhongguo ditu chubanshe, 1987), 16-17.]

🔹 Follow IIAS on Bluesky!➡️ Join us on our newest social media platform .bsky.social🔹 Bluesky is a decentralized social ...
21/01/2025

🔹 Follow IIAS on Bluesky!

➡️ Join us on our newest social media platform .bsky.social

🔹 Bluesky is a decentralized social app in parallel with Twitter. It is currently only available to desktop and iPhone users.

We invite applications for the Chair of Taiwan Studies at Leiden University and the International Institute for Asian St...
13/01/2025

We invite applications for the Chair of Taiwan Studies at Leiden University and the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS).

The Chair offers a five-month Professorial Fellowship for a visiting scholar specialising in Taiwan Studies, who will teach and conduct research at Leiden University and IIAS in the first semester of the 2025-2026 academic year.

Deadline: 15 Febr. 2025.


https://mailchi.mp/iias/chair-taiwan-studies-2526

🔸 IIAS will be hosting an event that is part of its Buddhist Studies Lectures, “Uncovering Ritual Traces in Javanese Bro...
09/01/2025

🔸 IIAS will be hosting an event that is part of its Buddhist Studies Lectures, “Uncovering Ritual Traces in Javanese Bronze Mandalas”

🔸 Throughout the Buddhist world, mandala depictions take on many forms. They are often sculpted in stone and wood, printed on clay, painted on silk and as murals, drawn in ink on paper – but few of them are cast in bronze.

🔸 This lecture will focus on the only extant examples in 10th-century Buddhist visual culture of large ensembles of small, individual bronze sculptures forming three-dimensional mandala assemblies of deities.

🔸 Dr. Mathilde Mechling is a postdoctoral researcher for the ERC project MANTRATANTRAM. Her research examines the circulation of Buddhist maṇḍala depictions, ritual practices, and ritual agents across Monsoon Asia, with a particular focus on bronze statuary and ritual implements from Indonesia.

⏰ January 15 | 16:00 ~ 17:00

📍 Witte Singel 27A, Herta Mohr Building, Room 0.28

⚠️ This event is in-person and free of charge. Please register as space is limited!

🔗 For more information and registration, please visit https://www.iias.asia/events/uncovering-ritual-traces-javanese-bronze-mandalas



[image: Bronze sculptures found in desa Candirejo, Nganjuk, East Java, in 1913. Photo: OD-2248 (dated 1915), The Kern Institute, Leiden University Library Special Collections]

📢 Call for applications: ‘Regenerating the Ngong River. A Journey of Riparian Planning, Renewal and Transformation”💧 In-...
02/01/2025

📢 Call for applications: ‘Regenerating the Ngong River. A Journey of Riparian Planning, Renewal and Transformation”

💧 In-Situ Engagement Project 2025 (ISEP 2025): the International Institute for Asian Studies, River Cities Network together with the local co-organisers Akiba Mashinani Trust, GoDown Arts Centre, Women In Real Estate, University of Nairobi, Building Climate Resilience with the Urban Poor, Government of Kenya, will organise a seven-day intensive in-situ engagement project in the city of Nairobi with the primary objective to reimagine and transform a 15-km section of the Ngong River riparian corridor into an integrated, resilient, sustainable, and vibrant green space that supports ecosystem and community well-being.

⚠️ The deadline for applications is Friday 7 February 2025.

📍 This project will take place in Nairobi, Kenya

⏰ The in-situ event will take place from 7-14 September 2025

🔗 For more information, please visit https://www.iias.asia/events/regenerating-ngong-river

As we close the chapter on 2024, the reflects on a year marked by significant milestones and meaningful progress.🔸This...
02/01/2025

As we close the chapter on 2024, the reflects on a year marked by significant milestones and meaningful progress.

🔸This year, IIAS organized a wide array of lectures and workshops, issues, and episodes.

🔸The 13th edition of in , Indonesia, was a remarkable gathering that celebrated the vibrancy and diversity of Asian studies on an international stage.

🔸We proudly welcomed a new cohort of visiting , further strengthening our mission to foster collaboration and scholarly exchange.

🔸In addition, our relocation to the new Herta Mohr building represents a step forward in our journey, positioning us to achieve even greater impact as we move into 2025.

⭐We extend our heartfelt gratitude to our audience, collaborators, and dedicated staff for their
continued support and partnership. Your contributions have been essential to our success in 2024.
As we look ahead to 2025, we are excited to build on this year’s achievements and explore new opportunities for growth and connection!⭐

🔗 Keep up with all of our initiatives at https://www.iias.asia

🔸IIAS is hosting a hybrid (Lunch) Lecture as part of the Urban Asia Presentation Series🔸This presentation is entitled ‘R...
23/12/2024

🔸IIAS is hosting a hybrid (Lunch) Lecture as part of the Urban Asia Presentation Series

🔸This presentation is entitled ‘Relocating the Tamil Yoginis: The Shifting Status of a Temple Town’ and it will be given by Dr. Emma Stein, Associate Curator of Southeast Asian and South Asian Art at the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art in Washington, DC, USA.

🔸In this presentation, Dr. Emma Stein examines Kaveripakkam’s shifting status and explores possible reasons for relocating the sculptures. She also shares plans for an exhibition that reunites the Tamil Yoginis.

⏰ January 14 | 12:30 ~ 15:00

📍 Witte Singel 27A, Herta Mohr Building, Room 0.28

⚠️ Please register as space is limited. We will serve lunch for registered in-person attendees.

➡️ To register and find out more about this event, visit: https://www.iias.asia/events/relocating-tamil-yoginis-shifting-status-temple-town

[Photo: Yogini in The Art of Knowing in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Himalayas, National Museum of Asian Art, Smithsonian Institution (S1987.905), photo by Colleen Dugan]

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Witte Singel 27A
Leiden
2311BG

Openingstijden

Maandag 09:00 - 17:00
Dinsdag 09:00 - 17:00
Woensdag 09:00 - 17:00
Donderdag 09:00 - 17:00
Vrijdag 09:00 - 17:00

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From March 16 to 19, #IIAS participated in the #AAS2023 conference in Boston, USA. In this 25-second video, you can see what happened in those 4 days, from the IIAS booth and its beloved guests, to the opening ceremony and the Angkor Dance Troupe, and of course, the special Tea Blending Experience! #IIAS #AsianStudies #IIAS_leiden #IIAS_AsianStudies #LeidenUniversity #AAS2023 #Boston

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Our Story

IIAS hosts a range of visiting fellows who benefit from one of the world’s largest concentration of scholars and collections on Asia. IIAS addresses current and long term historical trends through its three research clusters: Global Asia, Asian Cities and Asian Heritages. IIAS encourages the multi-disciplinary and comparative study of Asia and promotes national and international cooperation, thus linking the expertise of scholars and practitioners. It acts as an interface between academic and non-academic partners including cultural, social and policy organisations. IIAS offers a unique range of communication instruments enabling it to reach out to thousands of academics and professionals worldwide. IIAS’s periodical ‘The Newsletter’ enjoys a global readership of 50,000. It features research, thematic articles, reviews, photo essays, announcements and institutional news.