11277

GRE 102 Basic Greek II

Carolyn Dewald

M T W Th .

10:30 - 11:30 am

OLIN 304

FLLC

A continuation of Greek 101. Students will master advanced grammar and syntax and begin preliminary readings in Plato, Demosthenes, Sophocles, Euripides, and other Classical authors.  Class size: 15

11278

GRE 202 Intermediate Greek II

Carolyn Dewald

M . W . .

1:30 - 2:50 pm

OLIN 304

FLLC

In order to enter the spirit of Greek lyric, we will begin by reading for a couple of weeks the opening the Homeric Hymn to Apollo, which sings of the birth, haunts and skills of the god who presides over lyric composition and performance. We will then read selected poems of the two great poets of Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus, and later in the spring enter the world of victory song in odes of Pindar and Bacchylides. For a final stretch we will study a few of the great choruses of the Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Aristophanes, to be chosen in consultation with student interest. Careful attention will be paid from the beginning to meter, to questions of original performance practices, and to the occasions for which the texts we have were first fashioned. Class size: 15

11300

LAT 102 Elementary Latin II

Benjamin Stevens

M T W Th .

8:50 - 9:50 am

OLIN 305

FLLC

The second semester of a year-long survey of Latin language and literature. Our goals are: (1) to master morphology, syntax, and essential vocabulary; (2) to achieve sufficient fluency for continuous readings in prose and poetry; and (3) to continue exploring classical Latin literary history and aspects of ancient Roman culture. Prerequisite: successful completion of Latin 101 or permission of instructor. Class size: 22

11276

LAT 202 Intermediate Latin II

William Mullen

M . W . .

3:10 - 4:30 pm

OLIN 301

FLLC

A partial survey and close study of the great, 'late' or 'post-classical' Latin author who, more than any other, is the bridge between Roman antiquity and the Christian middle ages. We read substantial portions of three important works -- Confessiones, De Doctrina Christiana, and De Ciuitate Dei -- in Latin, all three and some others completely in English, and some criticism and scholarship. Our goals are: (1) to solidify knowledge of essential vocabulary, morphology, and syntax; (2) to develop fluency in reading Latin, especially Latin prose; and (3) to consider from a variety of critical perspectives aesthetic and thematic questions raised by Augustine and his writing. Prerequisite: successful completion of Latin 201 or permission of instructor. Class size: 15

11669

CLAS / LIT 125   The Odyssey of Homer

Daniel Mendelsohn

. . . . F

10:10  -  12:30 pm

OLIN 205

ELIT

This course will consist of an intensive reading of Homer’s Odyssey over the course of a single semester.  The course is designed to introduce freshmen to more profound and sophisticated techniques of reading and thinking about texts than they will have thus far encountered.  After two introductory sessions, in which students will be introduced to the large issues particular both to this genre (the archaic Greek world, oral composition, the Homeric Question) and to this particular text (“sequels,” epic cycle, the prominence of women, narrative closure), we will read through the epic at a rate of two books per week; two summary sessions will conclude the semester as we look back at the large literary and cultural issues raised by this essential document of the Western tradition: travel as a narrative vehicle for (self-) discovery, the competing satisfactions of the journey and the arrival, the poem’s special interest in poetry and narrative creation. A premium will be placed on student participation in class discussion, and each student will be asked to present a book of the poem (focusing on structural analysis, interpretative issues, etc.) to the class.  At least two papers, midterm, final exam. This course is designed particularly for first-year students. Class size: 22

11402

CLAS / LIT 204A Comp Lit I: Ancient Quarrels – Literature and Critique in Classical Antiquity

Thomas Bartscherer

. T . Th .

10:10 - 11:30 am

RKC 200

ELIT

See Literature section for description. Class size: 20

11368

ARTH 248 Roma in Situ

Diana Minsky

. T . Th .

4:40 - 7:00 pm

FISHER ANNEX

AART

See Art History section for description.

11275

CLAS 257 Archaic Greece

William Mullen

. T . Th .

1:30 - 2:50 pm

OLIN 201

FLLC

This course has been designed as a complement to Classical Studies’ regularly offered CLASSICS 157, “The Athenian Century”, and can be taken before or after that course. Its temporal span is roughly 7^th through 5^th century, and its readings are non-Athenian, even though some are in the 5^th century itself. Because of the fragmentary nature of so many of these archaic texts—literary, philosophical, proto-scientific, proto-historical—it will be possible for us to read in translation many authors in their entirety. In literature we will omit the Homeric epics (too large for this course) and start with Hesiod and the Homeric Hymns, then move on to some of the greatest lyric poets: Alkman, Sappho, Alcaeus, Archilochus, Anacreon, Simonides, Bacchylides, Pindar. Elegiac poets such as Terpander in Sparta, Theognis in Boeotia, and Solon in Athens (our sole early Athenian author) have much to tell us about values in their respective societies and epochs. We will read most of the pre-Socratics, in whom the beginnings of both science and western philosophy are internested. The study of Hecataeus gives a glimpse into proto-historical writing. All these readings will be framed by present-day historical scholarship on the archaic period. Some of the masterpieces of archaic sculpture and architecture will also be looked at for their kinship in spirit with our chosen texts. Class size: 15

11303

CLAS 326 Afterlives of Antiquity: Posthumanism and its Classics

Benjamin Stevens Screenings:

M . W . . Su . . .

10:10 - 11:30 am 7:00 - 10:00 pm

RKC 200 OLIN 102

HUM/DIFF

Cross-listed: Literature If the classics have been used to define 'humanity', then how may 'classics' be defined for a posthuman world? What would it mean to speak of the 'posthumanities'? In this seminar, we consider how processes of classification and canon-formation -- i.e., the selection of items in, as, and for 'culture' -- may serve as material for cultural critique: viz., by exposing superficially factual claims about what is essential, timeless, or real for their deeper complicity in what is, properly, the products of historically contingent and materially mediated ideologies. We focus on works that suggest reclassifications, even decanonizations, of a liberal humanist subject -- 'the human being' -- in discursible relations to its others. Beginning with a study of philology or textual criticism, we consider alternatives to a classical image of 'human subject(ivity)'. Areas of interest include gender and ethnicity; anthropology and zoology; other(ed) organic biologies, including genetic, surgical, and extraterrestrial; inorganic 'biologies', including artificial intelligence and life; and transhumanism, including the 'coming singularity', in which we may (be) witness (to) a posthumanist return to an image of "transcendental Man". Literary and otherwise artistic texts from, e.g., Apuleius, Atwood, Dick, Edson, LeGuin, Shakespeare, Sophocles, Stoppard, and Wells; films by, e.g., Cameron, Cronenberg, Demme, Kubrick, Lang, Scott, Tarkovsky; critical readings in, e.g., Baudrillard, Benjamin, Dawkins, Deleuze and Guattari, Eliot, Feyerabend, Foucault, Haraway, Hayles, Jameson, Lyotard, Mandelbrot, Sontag. We conclude by attempting posthumanist readings of Bardian 'canons', including the Language & Thinking anthology, the First-Year Seminar syllabus, and the book of Genesis. Regular film screenings. Prerequisite: moderated junior or senior standing or permission of instructor; knowledge of ancient Greek or Latin potentially helpful but not required. Preference to Classical Studies and other L&L program concentrators, or to students with some familiarity with textual criticism. Class size: 15

11421

CLAS 362 Plato's Writing:Dialog and Dialectic

Thomas Bartscherer

. T . . .

3:10 - 5:30 pm

OLIN 305

HUM

Cross-listed: Literature, Philosophy Interpreters of Plato have often asked why he wrote in dialogue form, and the answers proposed have frequently appealed to Plato’s conception of dialectic, although the meaning of that term in his texts is itself a matter of considerable debate. In this course, we shall be examining Plato’s writings from both a literary and a philosophical perspective. Our main business will be close and careful reading of whole dialogues, paying particular attention to the hermeneutical implications of the dialogue form—including such features as dramatic setting, character, and the interrogative mode itself—and the conception of dialectic as it emerges both in and through Plato’s writing. Readings from Plato will include Euthyphro, Euthydemus, Meno, Phaedrus, Republic, and Sophist. Primary readings will be complemented by a sampling of secondary scholarship that illustrates the wide range of modern approaches to Plato. All readings in English. Class size: 15

11413

HIST 2110 Early Middle Ages

Alice Stroup

. T . Th .

10:10 - 11:30 am

OLIN 308

HIST

See History section for description.

11139

REL 242 Hinduism in the Epics

Richard Davis

. T . Th .

8:30 - 9:50 am

OLIN 202

FLLC/DIFF

See Religion section for description