Winter

Immerse yourself in the Greek poetry written by various authors from ancient Greece and the subsequent Hellenic tradition. Readings this quarter concentrate on (a) substantial selection(s) of Greek poetry (e.g. Sophocles, Euripides). This class focuses on the literary and historical context of the text(s) in question, as well as the rhetorical and stylistic qualities of Greek poetry. Review of grammar and the development of vocabulary will occur as necessary. 

Introduction to Attic Greek introduces students to the fundamentals of the ancient Greek language through which students may access the worlds of Homer, Sappho, Plato, Thucydides, and Sophocles (among countless others). This course represents the second step. Course work continues to involve the reading and writing of Attic Greek, alongside the further development of vocabulary and the formal study of grammar. Students will increase their reading proficiency as they engage with longer, more complex, and more interesting sentences and passages, including selections from authentic texts. Successful completion of this course will prepare students for GREK 103. 

Accelerated Introduction to Classical Latin introduces students to the fundamentals of classical Latin through a sequence of two courses. By the end of this second and final course, students will have encountered all the most commonly used Latin grammar and an even larger collection of Latin vocabulary. Their reading proficiency continues to increase by engaging longer, more complex, and more interesting Latin. The second half of the course subsequently focuses on the reading of increasingly longer selections from authentic Latin texts. Through these readings, students explore a range of authors and genres, who touch upon various aspects of the Roman world, not only the history of the city, but also the society, culture, politics, and religion of its people. Successful completion of this course will prepare students for intermediate Latin courses (LATN 20100-20200-20300). 

Immerse yourself in the Latin prose written by various authors from ancient Rome through the long tradition and reception of Latin literature. Readings this quarter concentrate on (a) substantial selection(s) of Roman prose (e.g. the epistles of Seneca or Pliny, the histories of Livy or Sallust). This class focuses on the literary and historical context of the text(s) in question, as well as the rhetorical and stylistic qualities of Latin prose. Review of grammar and the development of vocabulary will occur as necessary. 

Introduction to Classical Latin introduces students to the fundamentals of the Latin language through which students may access the works of Vergil, Horace, Cicero, Tacitus, and Ovid (among countless others). This course represents the second step. Course work continues to involve the reading and writing of Latin, alongside the further development of vocabulary and the formal study of grammar. Students will increase their reading proficiency as they engage with longer, more complex, and more interesting sentences and passages, including selections from authentic texts. Successful completion of this course will prepare students for LATN 103. 

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.

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.

Embracing the condition of not knowing as a pathway to freedom is at the core of two ancient philosophical schools now commonly known as Skepticism and Daoism. This course is a literary and philosophical comparison of two highly sophisticated texts in these traditions: the Greek Outlines of Pyrrhonism of Sextus Empiricus, which records the teachings of Pyrrho, founder of the Hellenistic Skeptic school; and the Chinese text known as the Zhuangzi, which records that teacher’s anticonventionalist and paradoxical counsels for achieving a life of “free and easy roaming.” Course readings are all in English, and no knowledge of the classical Chinese and Greek languages or their philosophies is needed, but separate meetings can be scheduled for students interested in reading either of these texts in the original.

The class will study the history of the Roman republic in light of contemporary normative theory, and likewise interrogate the ideological origins of contemporary republicanism in light of historical concerns. The focus will be on sovereignty, public law, citizenship, and the form of ancient empire.

We shall read extended selections from poetry writers of recognized importance to the Latin tradition. Our sampling of texts will emphasize writers of the Late Republic and Early Principate.