Graduate

Tertullian was the first to attribute the authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews to Barnabas, and that ascription found favor with no less an ancient figure as Jerome, and even with notable scholars of the late nineteenth and early 20th centuries, such as Albrecht Ritschl and Friedrich Blass. Although no one can know who wrote it, there are fruitful literary and thematic parallels between the Epistle that bears the name Barnabas and the canonical Hebrews, including their critique of Judaism and their interpretatio Christiana of the Hebrew Bible, with particular regard to Levitical institutions and the temple. We will read thoroughly the Greek text of each treatise with focus on the language and style of the two texts, their relation to Hellenistic and Alexandrian Judaism, and their respective treatments of Hebrew Bible/Septuagintal themes.

What has the story of Persephone meant to different people at different times? Is there a “story” of Persephone, or are there many stories—and if the latter, how can we make sense of this diversity of material? How can we use narratives and rituals connected with Persephone to study mythology and religion in antiquity more broadly? How have scholars and artists in the modern period interpreted Persephone? What options are available to us, as students and scholars of the ancient world, for thinking about Persephone, and what significance does Persephone have for us today?

This course combines close-reading of ancient literary texts with an introduction to the study of mythology. Students will read such texts as “The Homeric Hymn to Demeter” while also being introduced to traditions of interpretation of the Persephone myth from antiquity to the present. The myth of Persephone acts as a case study for larger methodological questions: how we study mythologies of the past, and how they continue to shape our thinking today.

The figure of the outlaw looms large in the political and literary imaginations of the Roman and American empires. But what is an outlaw? What does it mean for the law that some people are outside of it? What, if anything, makes violence within the law different from violence without it? How does the rhetoric of legality and criminality implicate ideas of gender and ethnicity? We will explore these questions (among others) using methods from ancient history, literary criticism, and political theory, as we range from historical scholarship and ancient novels to modern films and musical albums. All readings will be in English. No prior training in Roman history required.

This graduate seminar serves as an introductory survey of the range of evidentiary categories, methods, and main interpretive frameworks used by practitioners in the field of ancient historical studies. We will chart the development of historiographical ideas and techniques of analysis of texts and material culture, as well as discuss some of the critical approaches to ancient history in practice today. Key topics will include frameworks like positivism, determinism, and (post)structuralism; dating, periodization, and scale; culture history; economic history; cliometrics and big data analyses; social history and studies of gender and the everyday; eurocentrism and postcolonialism; and methods drawn from e.g. epigraphy, papyrology, archaeology, and art history. Assignments will center on the crafting of original research projects and the practice of historiographical writing. The course focuses on the ancient Mediterranean but is open to MA and PHD students from any field.

Is solitude a good thing? In this course, we will explore how the poets and philosophers of archaic and classical Greece thought about aloneness, particularly the powers and perils of solitude for the individual and the community. We will read portions of Homer’s Iliad, Hesiod’s Theogony, Sophocles’ Philoctetes, and the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, together with excerpts of ancient philosophy, with an aim of thinking through the relationship between individual and community, which is fraught with tension in so many time periods and cultures. We will also reconsider our understanding of the ancient Greeks as primarily “public” in their motivations and values, in light of the array of possibilities offered by solitude in many of these texts.

This course is a practical introduction to the styles of classical Latin prose. After a brief and systematic review of Latin syntax, we combine regular exercises in composition with readings from a variety of prose stylists. Our goal is to increase the students' awareness of the classical artists' skill and also their own command of Latin idiom and sentence structure.

Undergraduates consent of instructor.

The object of the course is to acquiant ourselves with several philosophical works among Augustine's earliest writings. We will read Augustine's De magistro in Latin. Written in 389, it represents a dialogue with his son, Adeodatus, on the nature of language. We will also read four other works of Augustine in English: Soliloquies, De Ordine, Contra Academicos, and the autobiographical books of the Confessions. Alongside these are assigned some notable works of secondary literature on the Augustine's philosophy of language and epistemology.

The goal of this course is threefold: 1. To read through some 1500 lines of Lucan’s epic on the war between Caesar and Pompey in Latin; 2. To read all of the epic in English; 3. To explore and discuss the critical responses to this work in the 20th century, including literary, philosophical, and psychological frameworks.

Online Materials: Bibliography at http://www.let.kun.nl/V.Hunink/documents/lucanbciii biblio-graphy.html.
Full Latin text at http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/ lucan.html.

We read the text of the historian in Greek and contextualize his contribution to the classical period, with some discussion of his perspectives on the past, people, and artifacts he records.

This seminar will study claims to Roman identity across cultures, regions, and periods. Who belonged to the Roman community at any time and who was excluded? How did foundation narratives, asylum, conquest, the expansion of citizenship, notions of ethnicity, processes of assimilation, and the passage of time shape the contours of groups who saw themselves as Roman? Literature in many genres and languages, and over many centuries, addresses these questions. The course will not be limited to the ancient Roman experience but will expand to include claims in the medieval West and especially the eastern Roman empire, aka Byzantium. A self-defined Roman community persisted there longer than elsewhere, in fact down to the present. Selected claims to be the new Romans in the medieval and modern West will also be examined. Students will read and discuss original sources (in Greek and Latin, depending on their language skills) and modern scholarship.

This is a continuation of CLAS 43226. This quarter is reserved for the researching and writing by students of article-length seminar papers, and we will meet regularly to workshop the papers-in-progress.