Relevant Classics: A Month and More of Online Seminars

Classics is often thought of as fusty and elitist. But this year Classics, Ancient History, and Egyptology at Swansea University is seeking to challenge that perception. The pandemic, while horrific in its effects, has provided opportunities to reconfigure and reconsider our teaching in radical ways. Remaining face-to-face elements for us include study groups where spirited discussion of key topics on which ancient studies can shine a light takes place. It is to complement such study groups that this year we are offering a series of cutting-edge online seminars with distinguished international speakers, aimed at both our students and a broader audience, on the thought-provoking theme of ‘Relevant Classics’. Members of the public, both local and from around the globe, are very welcome. All sessions will be at 5pm on Mondays. Please sign up to our mailing list by sending an email to ancientworldswanseaseminar@gmail.com to receive the Zoom links.

Here’s the schedule (with links and Twitter handles):

November 9 – OLCAP Keynote Lecture, Clare Rowan (Warwick): ‘The Materiality of the Ephemeral: The Tokens of Roman Italy’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMy2GX_BoLc @ancient_tokens

November 16 – Roberta Mazza (Manchester): ‘Sappho, Papyrology, and the Material Turn’ https://facesandvoices.wordpress.com @papyrologyatman

November 23 – Hannah Čulík-Baird (Boston): ‘The Fragment and the Future’ https://classicssocialjustice.wordpress.com/ @opietasanimi

November 30 – Ayelet Haimson Lushkov (Austin, Texas): ‘Troubling the Scorer: Livy and the Poetics of Accuracy’ https://www.theguardian.com/profile/ayelet-haimson-lushkov

December 7 – Nandini Pandey (Madison, Wisconsin): ‘Writing What You Know? On Being “Diverse” and Researching Roman Diversity’ https://eidolon.pub/@npandey1 @global_classics

December 14 – Mathias Hanses (Penn State): ‘“A Fire Kindled in Egypt, Replenished by Greece, Scattered Burning By Rome”: The Ancient Mediterranean in the Works of W. E. B. Du Bois’ https://www.eosafricana.org/executive-committee