Lund University ( ), located
in Lund
in southernmost Sweden
, is one of
Sweden's most prestigious universities
and one of Scandinavia's largest
institutions for education and research, frequently ranked among
the world's top 100 universities. The university was founded
in 1666 and is the second oldest
Swedish
university, but can arguably trace its roots back to 1438, when
a
studium generale was founded in
Lund.
Lund
University has eight faculties,
with additional campuses in the cities of Malmö
and Helsingborg
, with ca 25,000 students in more than 50 different
programmes and 800 separate courses. It belongs to the
League of
European Research Universities as well as the global
Universitas 21 network.
The
university traditionally centers on the Lundagård park adjacent to the Lund Cathedral
, with various departments spread in different
locations in town, but mostly concentrated in a belt stretching
north from the park connecting to the university hospital area and
continuing out to the northeastern periphery of the town, where one
finds the large campus of the Lund Institute of
Technology.
History
The city
of Lund
has a long history as a center for learning and was
the ecclesiastical centre and seat of the archbishop of Denmark
.
A cathedral school (the Katedralskolan
) for the training of clergy was established in
1085 and is today Scandinavia's oldest school.
A
studium generale (a
medieval university education)
was founded in 1425, but had to close in 1536 in connection with
the Danish
reformation.
After the
Treaty of Roskilde in
1658, the
Scanian lands came under the
possession of the Swedish Crown, which quickly founded the Lund
University in 1666 as the means of Swedification.
It was the fifth
university under the Swedish king, after Uppsala
University
(1477), the University of Tartu
(1632, now in Estonia
), the
Academy of Åbo (1640, now in
Finland
), and the
University of
Greifswald
(founded 1456; Swedish 1648–1815, now in Germany
). It
is the second-oldest university on Swedish ground today.
The university was named
Academia Carolina after
Charles X Gustav of Sweden. The
name was in some formal use until the late 19th century, when Lund
University became the widespread denomination.
The university was at its founding granted four faculties:
law,
theological,
medicine and
philosophy. They were the corner stones, and for
more than 200 years this system was in effect. Towards the end of
the 17th century, the number of students hovered around 100. Some
notable professors in the early days were
Samuel Pufendorf, a juridical historian;
and
Canutus Hahn and
Kristian Papke in philosophy.
The
Scanian War in 1676 led to a
shut-down, which lasted until 1682. The university was re-opened
largely due to regional patriots, but the university was not to
enjoy a high status until well into the 19th century.
Lecturing rooms were
few, and lectures were held in the Lund Cathedral
and its adjacent chapel. The professors were
underpaid.
In 1713,
Charles XII of Sweden
entered Lund. He stayed in Lund for three years, in between his
warlike expeditions. The town of Lund and the university attracted
a temporary attention boost. The most notable lecturer during this
time was
Andreas Rydelius.
Peace was finally restored with the death of Charles XII in 1718,
and during the first half of the 18th century the university was
granted added funds. The number of students was now well around
500. Despite not being on par with Uppsala University, it had still
built a solid reputation and managed to attract prominent
professors.
Around 1760 the university reputation dropped as the number of
students fell below 200, most of whom hailed from around the
province. However, by 1780 its reputation was largely restored, and
continued to rise through the 1820s. This was largely owing to
popular and well-educated lecturers particularly in philology; the
prominent professor
Esaias Tegnér
was a particularly notable character with widespread authority. He,
in turn, attracted others towards Lund. One of these was the young
theological student
C. G. Brunius, who
studied ancient languages under Tegnér and were later to become
professor of Greek. With time he was to devote himself to
architectures and he redesigned several of Lund's buildings, as
well as churches of the province.
Women at the university

Lunds Universitetsbibliotek
(LUB), the main university library.
The first woman to study in Lund was the medical student Hedda
Andersson who entered the university in 1880 (two years before the
next woman to do so). Hilma Borelius was the first woman who
finished a doctorate in Lund, in 1910. The first woman to be
appointed to a professor's chair was the historian
Birgitta Odén (1965). In 1992
Boel Flodgren, Professor of Business Law, was
appointed
rector magnificus (or,
strictly speaking,
rectrix magnifica) of Lund University.
As such, she was the first woman to be a head of a European
university.
Academics
Lund University is internationally known as Scandinavia's largest
research university. The university has eight faculties and many
research centres and specialized institutes. Approximately 25,000
students study within one of the 50 educational programs, the
eighteen international masters programmes or the 800 free-standing
courses. Almost three hundred courses are, or can be, held in
English for the benefit of our international exchange students.
There are several programs allowing foreign students to study
abroad at the University. Notable exchangees include United States
Supreme Court Justice
Ruth Bader
Ginsburg, who spent time at Lund University in the 1960s
conducting research.
Faculties
There are
also departments located in Malmö
, including
Malmö Academy of Music,
and Helsingborg
.
Library

University Library
Lund University library was established in 1666 at the same time as
the university and is one of Sweden's oldest and largest. Since
1698 it has received
legal deposit
copies of everything printed in the country.
Today six Swedish
libraries receive legal deposit copies, but only Lund and the
Royal
Library
in Stockholm are required to keep everything for
posterity. Swedish imprints make up half of the collections,
which amount to 170,000 linear metres of shelving (2006). The
library serves 620,000 loans per year, the staff is 200 full-time
equivalents, and the 33 branch libraries house 2600 reading room
desks.
The current main building at Helgonabacken opened in 1907.
Before
that, the old building was Liberiet
close to the city's cathedral. Liberiet
was built as a library in the 15th century, but now serves as a
cafe.
Student life
Lund is known for its particularly active student life, revolving
around three central structures: the student nations, Akademiska
Föreningen and the student unions.
Student Nations
The
nations in Lund are a central
part of the university's history, initially serving as
residential colleges for students,
organized by geographic origin.
Östgöta Nation, the oldest
nation, was established in 1668, two years after the university was
founded. While the nations still offer limited housing, today they
are best described as
student
societies. It is required to enroll in a nation to receive
grades at the university.
Today students may enroll in any nation, although the nations still
preserve their geographic names. In most cases it does not matter
what nation one enrolls in, but different nations offer different
activities for interested students. The fee of around 350
Swedish krona per semester (which also
includes student union membership fees), is the closest thing to a
tuition requirement found in Sweden.
Each nation has student housing, but the accommodations in no way
meet demand, and they are usually appointed according to a queue
system. Each nation has at least one pub evening per week, with a
following night club. The solemn peak event in the course of an
activity year is the organization of student balls once a year.
Most well known of the nation balls (as opposed to balls organized
by fraternities or student unions) is the ball hosted by Göteborgs
Nation - called the "Gustaf II Adolf Ball" (also known as the
"GA-Ball"). Most nations also host at least one
banquet per week, where a three course dinner is
served. Each nation also has different activities for students
interested in sports, arts, or partying. All activities within the
nations are voluntary.
Akademiska Föreningen (AF)

AF-Borgen, the student-run
complex at the heart of student life in Lund, May 2002.
In 1830, Professor
Carl Adolph
Agardh formed
Akademiska Föreningen (The Academic
Society), commonly referred to as AF, with the goal of "developing
and cultivating the academic life" by bringing students and faculty
from all departments and student nations together in one
organization. Prince
Oscar I, then Sweden's
Chancellor of Education, donated 2000 Kronor to help found the
society.
In 1848, construction began on
AF-Borgen (the AF Fortress), which is located opposite the
Main
Building
in Lundagård
. To this day, AF is the center of student life in
Lund, featuring many theater companies, a prize-winning student
radio (Radio AF), and organizing the
enormous Lundakarnevalen (the Lund Carnival) every four
years. "AF Bostäder", an independent foundation with close
ties to Akademiska Föreningen, maintans over 5,700 student
residences in Lund.
Student Unions

The Delphi residential area, located
in the northern part of Lund, is one of the large student housing
complexes run by AF Bostäder.
Currently each faculty has its own student union. Since 1995, a
central organization known as LUS (Lund University's Student Unions
[2563])
negotiates with the university administration, while most work is
done at the faculty level. The student unions that are members of
LUS are:
- The Ph.D. Student Union - [2564]
- Student Union of the Faculty of the Humanities - [2565]
- Student Union of the Faculty of Medicine - [2566]
- Student Union of Natural Sciences - [2567]
- Lunds Socialhögskolas Studentkår - [2568]
- Sjukgymnastinstitutets Studentkår
- Student Union of Social Sciences - [2569]
- Student Union of the Faculty of Theology - [2570]
- Vårdvetenskapliga Studentkåren - [2571]
- Teaterhögskolans Studentkår
- Malmö Konsthögskolas Studentkår
- Studentkåren vid Musikhögskolan i Malmö -
[2572]
The student unions that have chosen not to belong to LUS are:
- Student Union at Lund University, Faculty of Engineering -
[2573]
- The Student Union at the Faculty of Law - [2574]
- Lund Students of Economics - [2575]
- Flygskolekåren - [2576]
- Elevkåren vid YTH-utbildningen i Markaryd
- Studentkåren vid YTH
Notable people connected to Lund University
The following is a select list of some of the most notable people
who have been affiliated with Lund University as students or
academics, please refer to the main article for more
information.
- Anders Jahan Retzius
(1742-1821), naturalist.
- Elias Magnus Fries
(1794-1878), mycologist.
- Esaias Tegnér (1782-1846),
poet, bishop of Växjö.
- Peter
Estenberg (1686-1740), Greek Scholar, Professor, and advisor to
King Stanislaw (Stanisław Leszczyński) of
Poland
in the early
18th century.
- Tuve Hasselquist ( 1816 -
1891), Swedish American Lutheran minister and church leader
- Albert Victor
Bäcklund (1845-1912), mathematician and physicist (Bäcklund transform).
- Knut Wicksell (1851-1926),
economist.
- Johannes Rydberg (1854-1919),
physicist (Rydberg formula, Rydberg constant).
- V. Walfrid Ekman (1874-1954), oceanographer
(Ekman spiral, Ekman number).
- Marcel Riesz (1886-1969),
mathematician (Riesz function,
Riesz theorems, Riesz mean, Riesz
potential).
- Ivar Wickman 1872-1914),
neurologist, polio expert
- Manne Siegbahn (1886-1978),
Nobel Prize in Physics 1924.
Professor
at Uppsala
University
.
- Frans Gunnar Bengtsson
(1894-1954), author, The Long
Ships.
- Bertil Ohlin (1899-1979),
Nobel Prize in Economics 1977.
- Tage Erlander (1901-1985), Prime
Minister of Sweden, 1946-1969.
- Rune Elmqvist (1906-1996),
developer of the first implantable pacemaker.
- Torsten Hägerstrand
(1916-2004), cultural geographer.
- Sune Bergström (1916-2004),
Nobel Prize in
Medicine 1982.
- Carl Hellmuth Hertz
(1920-1990) pioneered medical
ultrasonography (with Inge
Edler).
- Sten Broman [2577] (1902 - 1983) Musician, music critic, tv host,
university active- founder of Uarda-akademien etc.
- Arvid Carlsson (1923-), Nobel Prize in
Medicine 2000 (Professor at Göteborgs university).
- Hans Alfredson
(1931-), writer, entertainer and film director, former head of
Skansen
.
- Lars Hörmander (1931-),
mathematician awarded the Fields medal
in 1962.
- Ingvar Carlsson (1934-), Prime
Minister of Sweden 1986-91, 1994-96.
- Michael Treschow (1943-),
chairman of Ericsson.
- Karl Johan Åström
(1934-), (Professor Emeritus),
IEEE Fellow, IEEE Medal of Honor for contributions to
Control Theory
- Björn Borg ([Tennis star)]
- Etzel Cardeña (1957-),
Thorsen Professor of Psychology, Director of the Center for
Research on Consciousness and Anomalous Psychology (CERCAP)
Partner universities
Europe
- University of Vienna
, Austria
- University of Tartu
, Estonia
- University of Orléans, France

- University of Greifswald
, Germany
- University of Heidelberg
, Germany
- Ludwig
Maximilian University of Munich
, Germany
- University of Passau
, Germany
- Saint Petersburg State
University, Russia

- University of Geneva
, Switzerland
- University of St. Gallen
, Switzerland
- University of Edinburgh, United
Kingdom

Elsewhere
- The University of Adelaide
, Australia
- Bond University
, Australia
- University of São Paulo,
Brazil

- McGill University
, Canada
- Queen’s University

- University of British
Columbia

- University of Ottawa

- University of
Chile, Chile

- Peking University
, China
- University of Hong Kong
, China
- University of Tokyo
, Japan
- University of Cape Town
, South
Africa
- University of California at Los
Angeles
, United
States
- University
of California at Santa Barbara
- University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill

- University of Texas at Austin

- University of Virginia

- Purdue University

- Babson College

See also
References
- New Partnership with Swedish University: Lund
University
- Lund University, Sweden, Euro Scholars
Website
- Lund University, The Solander Program
Website
- Universities in the Øresund Region, Øresund
Entrepreneurship Academy Website
- Welcome
to Lund University
- Top 200 Universities, Website of QS Top
Universities
- Shanghai Jiao Tong
University's Academic Ranking of World
Universities - 2007, 2006, 2005
- The Complete List: The Top 100 Global
Universities
- Historik
- Lunds universitet
- Organisation
- Linda, Bayer "Ruth Bader Ginsburg" (Philadelphia: Chelsea House
Publishers, 2000), 46.
- Lund University library website, statistics for 2006,
http://www.lub.lu.se/om-lub/organisation/lub-i-siffror-2006.html
- AF Bostäder History
- Lunds universitet from Nordisk familjebok, in Swedish.
- Lunds universitets historia : utgiven av universitetet till
dess 300-årsjubileum. 4 volumes. Lund: Lunds universitet
1968-1983. (The standard work on the history of the
university.)
- Magnus Laurentius Ståhl, Biographiske underrättelser om
professorer vid Kongl. universitetet i Lund, ifrån dess inrättning
till närvarande tid. ("Biographical notes on professors at the
Royal University of Lund from its foundation until the current
time") Christianstad
: L. Littorin, 1834. (public domain book
available on Google Print, [2578])
External links