Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (HCAS)

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

09/09/2026

Featured in the HCAS Alumni Gallery this month is Stephen Gill, Distinguished Research Professor of Political Science, Communications and Culture at York University. He was the inaugural Jane and Aatos Erkko Visiting Professor of HCAS in 2009–2010.

Stephen looks back on his time at the Collegium with great warmth. From friendly football matches to successful research symposia and lectures, he describes the year in Helsinki as a rewarding period of intellectual and social stimulation.

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

08/09/2026

How does the brain of a Formula 1 driver adapt to extreme speeds? HCAS Fellow Otto Lappi explains in a feature article of The New York Times how studying an elite athlete’s gaze may offer insight into this question.

Lappi is part of the INTELLIGENCE³ fellowship program at HCAS. His Collegium project compares human intelligence and machine intelligence, focusing on characteristics that distinguish the two.

They are moving too fast for the normal mind to keep up, but elite drivers have more densely packed brain cells where it counts and use their minds more efficiently.

07/09/2026

HCAS Orientation Week is done and dusted!

Over four days, new and continuing fellows got to know one another through short presentations, long lunches, and chats around the coffee machine. The academic year is shaping up to be an exciting one, with projects ranging from European federalism international drug control and from elemental inequalities to Bantu languages.

We wrapped up the week with a cozy evening on Lonna Island, where many fellows had their first introduction to Finnish sauna culture. Some even dared to take a dip in the Baltic Sea!

01/09/2026

“What brings you to the Collegium?”

HCAS Orientation Week opened with a social mixer where new and continuing fellows shared the many reasons that brought them to Helsinki: a monograph manuscript ready to be developed into a book, a colleague’s recommendation, the National Library’s extensive collection of Slavic literature, and so forth.

As the week continues, newcomers will get to know the Collegium and the academic community around them. And over the months ahead, we will come together each Tuesday to learn more about one another’s work and ideas.

Read about our current fellows and their research on our website. Link in the comments.

17/08/2026

The Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (HCAS) invites applications for fixed-term appointments to begin in August 2027. We are seeking up to 15 Core Fellows and 1–2 Postdoctoral Fellows in the Arts.

Core Fellowships are open to scholars at all career stages (from postdoctoral researchers to full visiting professors), and range in duration from six months to three years, depending on the applicant’s career stage. The appointment of the Fellow in the Arts is for one year, and it is intended for individuals who either hold a doctoral degree in the arts or are engaged in artistic work and hold a doctoral degree in another academic field.

The Fall 2026 application period begins on 17 August 2026 and ends on 14 September 2026 at 23:59 local Helsinki time.

For more details, please visit our website:

Here you will find information on our application procedures