On 8 December 2024, the regime of Bashar al-Asad, the president of Syria whose dictatorial rule had been in place for decades (and, before that, his father Hafiz al-Asad’s), ended for good when he was overthrown through a revolution. To commemorate and reflect on this event and its possible implications for the future of Syria,…

This Winter School revolves on the theme of “commensality”, the prospect of coming together at the same table -or not-, with literal and metaphorical implications for respecting differences among those who share a meal.  As a field of growing research in the arena of public health, scholars now connect commensality and sociability to individual and communal well-being. In this Winter School, we propose…

On Wednesday November 12 at 5 pm Ahmed El Shamsy (University of Chicago) will give the 2025 Juynboll lecture entitled “Sunni constitutional theory in light of an early hadith about obedience.”  The lecture takes place at Leiden University in Lipsius 005. In this lecture El Shamsy shows that the claim that Sunnism is politically quietist,…

Since the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, on 8 December 2024, there are notable signs of hope and change within the country.  Interim-president al-Shara, who completely abandoned the path of Jihadism, has openly expressed the importance of equal rights for men, women and young people. What are the chances for women to play…