CLASSICS (CLAS)

This seminar takes a participatory approach to ancient Greek theater, exploring the dual nature of drama as performance and script. It provides a historical overview of the extraordinary Athenian fifth century (BCE), emphasizing ways theater interacts with art, law, myth, and politics. Theatrical exercises and performances complement several writing assignments. Honors version available.

This first-year seminar will involve a close reading of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Vergil's Aeneid, and as a transition from Homer to Vergil, students will also read the tragedies of Sophocles from fifth-century Athens. Honors version available.

This seminar will study the great tragic heroines of ancient Greek drama, focusing on Clytemnestra, Medea, Alcestis, Phaedra, the Trojan Women, Antigone. Students will also read a contemporary novel, by Fay Weldon, that engages many of these mythic women. Students will study the Greek tragedies intensively, along with their reception in later literature and art. Honors version available.

In this class, we examine descriptions of religious and magical practices in the multicultural contexts of ancient Greece and Rome. Our sources include literary accounts, legal documents, and material objects, such as inscriptions, amulets, tablets, magical images, and papyri.

Translated works of three Greek historians--Herodotus, Thucydides, and Polybius--will provide a lens through which to explore the capacity for literature and other modes of representation to convey history. Honors version available.

A study of Greek and Roman depictions of marginalized and peripheral peoples in both literary and visual sources, with consideration of the origin, development, and social roles ascribed to these groups.

Are there rules for crafting a successful speech? The art and the mechanisms of persuasion will be considered both as a discipline with its own laws and practices and as a window into the values and debates that animate the public life of diverse civilizations.

In this first-year seminar, students will investigate what films set in classical Roman antiquity say about contemporary culture, and will also attempt to understand their impact on the shaping of our sense of history.

This first-year seminar is an introduction to the history and art of Rome from antiquity through the present. Students will survey the entire period, but will look in particular at four specific periods in the city's life from the early second century CE until the present day.

The myth of Helen of Troy has inspired countless creative responses, from Homer's Iliad to Hollywood's Troy; all of them raise questions about the value of beauty and love within society. The course requires no prior knowledge of the classics, although you should be familiar with Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.

Special topics course; contents will vary each semester. Honors version available.

Introduction to the history, literature, religion, philosophy, science, art and architecture of Greece from Homer to Alexander the Great. Emphasis on primary sources. Honors version available.

A survey of Roman civilization from the beginning to the late empire, dealing with history, literature, art and architecture, philosophy and religion, and social and political institutions. Honors version available.

Introduction to the history and culture of ancient Greece, from the Bronze Age to the end of the Roman period, through field study of historical and archaeological sites in Greece.

Systematic study of the formation of medical terms from Greek and Latin roots, to build vocabulary and recognition. For general etymology see CLAS 125.

An introduction to the mythology of the ancient Greek and Roman world. Readings may include selections from Homer, Hesiod, Greek tragedy, and Vergil. Honors version available.

Study of classical epic and tragedy. Special emphasis on Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, and on the rethinking of Homeric epic in the tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides.

An investigation of the history, aesthetics, politics, and influence of theater in the ancient Greek and Roman world, with attention to themes of power, passion, rhetoric, resistance, gender, and identity. The course also includes a substantial practical component, with students taking on a number of the dramaturgical roles involved in the production of ancient drama.

Course examines law, religion, medicine, social practices, and ideologies in the lives of women in ancient Greece, from Homer to Hellenistic Egypt, using literature, art, and epigraphy. Honors version available.

Course examines the life of women in ancient Rome, from the first beginnings of the organized community in Rome through the early Empire, a period of about 900 years. Also explores aspects of the lives of women in provinces governed by Rome. Honors version available.

Exploration of gender constructs, what it meant to be a woman or a man, in antiquity, as revealed in literary, historical, and archaeological sources. Readings from Homer, Euripides, Plato, Ovid, Virgil, Juvenal, Petronius, and other ancient authors.

This course examines constructions of race and ethnicity in the ancient Mediterranean through art, literature, and archaeology. Students gain a background in the history and culture of the classical world that grounds critical analysis of the primary source evidence, both textual and material. By engaging with modern scholarship on ancient ideas about race and ethnic identity, students also learn to evaluate and critique secondary source material in their original contexts.

An introduction to classical civilization through study of its most important period in Greece. Attention to history, philosophy, and art. Lecture and discussion. Honors version available.

An introduction to classical civilization through study of the period in which it spreads beyond mainland Greece to influence and partially merge with the cultures of the Near East, Egypt, and Rome. Attention to history, literature, philosophy, and art. Lectures and discussion.

An introduction to classical civilization through study of the literature, history, and art of one of the most crucial periods in Roman history. Lectures and discussion. Honors version available.

An introduction to the civilization of the Roman Empire through study of the literature, history, and archaeology of its most colorful period.

Pagans and Christians in the Roman Empire. Special attention to the fundamental cultural and social changes resulting from the Christianization of the Empire.

Study of athletics as a unifying force in ancient society, emphasizing the Olympic games and other religious festivals. Consideration of athletic professionalism, propaganda, and social trends using literary and archaeological sources. Honors version available.

The Iliad, the Odyssey. Hesiod, heroic and oral poetry.

An introduction to the three great tragedians of ancient Greece and to their historical and cultural context. Discussion is based on close readings of the English translations of selected plays by Aeschylus, Euripides, and Sophocles. Honors version available.

Introduction to the lyric and elegiac poetry of antiquity in English translation, including Hesiod, Sappho, Catullus, Ovid, and Horace. Honors version available.

Study of classical writers' influence on selected genres of English poetry. Honors version available.

Explores ethnographic writing in the Ancient Mediterranean. How did the Greeks and Romans write about Persians, Egyptians, Scythians, Gauls, Germans, Britons, Hyperboreans, Spartans, and other peoples across time? In what ways did they understand their own identities and explain the distinctions they perceived between other peoples? The course will include some comparison of modern conceptions of ethnicity and depictions of group identities (in film, literature, and other media).

Cicero and Caesar provide a window into the end of the Roman Republic, and the end of the Republic provides a privileged ground for applying different methodologies of research (e.g. history, literature, political science, philosophy, etc.). This interdisciplinary course includes student presentations.

The topic of this course varies according to instructor, but in all cases is designed to bring together all departmental majors in their examination of a particular topic in the study of the ancient Mediterranean from an interdisciplinary perspective. Seminar format and research focus. Majors only, junior or senior standing required.

This course allows a student to design and execute an independent research project under the supervision of a faculty member. Although the specifics will be determined on a case-by-case basis by the student and the faculty supervisor, the project will normally involve the careful study of key primary sources and engagement with relevant scholarship, and culminate in a major research paper (around 25 pages) or a suitable equivalent in another format (e.g., website, video). Permission of the Instructor.

Students may suggest to the chair of the department topics for individual or group study. Advance arrangements required.

The study in English translation of selections from Herodotus, Thucydides, Livy, Tacitus, and others, with consideration of their literary qualities and their readability as historians. Honors version available.

This course combines a survey of the main areas of Roman law in their social and historical context with the close study of primary texts illustrating Roman law in practice, especially case studies from the writings of Roman legal experts; particular attention is given to the logic and application of ancient Roman legal thought and to its social and ethical implications. Honors version available.

A systematic review of English grammar for students of Latin and Greek, combined with practical exercises in prose style and effective writing.

Honors course for departmental majors in classical archaeology, classical civilization, Greek, and Latin.

Honors course for departmental majors in classical archaeology, classical civilization, Greek, and Latin.

This course is an introduction to the issues, skills, and resources relevant to the successful teaching of undergraduate courses in Classics Departments at post-secondary educational institutions.

This course is an introduction to skills and practices that play a key part in the professional lives of classicists and classical archaeologists working in post-secondary educational institutions.

This course is a requirement for the M.A. in Classics. The goal of the course is to provide pre-M.A. students with an overview of the field and of its development; and to provide them with resources and methods that will help them to conduct their own research in an informed fashion. Graduate students only.

Intensive interdisciplinary introduction to women in antiquity, using literary, historical, and visual materials. Open to senior classics majors by permission of the instructor.

Graduate research seminar. Topics vary from year to year. Graduate standing.