From the Waterloo Record:
It was a time of change, a time when the developments of a single culture were felt, as never before, beyond its borders.
The Hellenistic Age spans the roughly 300 years between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC — not an overly-lengthy period of time, but a significant one.
It marked the first time in the western world that the changes within one society — Greece — had lasting impacts on neighbouring cultures and civilizations to come, from Spain to India.
It represented the most cross-cultural interaction that had ever been seen, at every level of life — economics, politics, religion, language, science, culture — said the University of Waterloo’s Riemer Faber.
“This period is particularly rich, both in developments and in ideas,” Faber said.
It is in recognition of the significance of this often-neglected area that a new research institute dedicated to the period has been launched at UW.
The Waterloo Institute for Hellenistic Studies is believed to be the first of its kind in North America to conduct interdisciplinary research focusing on this period, said Faber, its director.
Although it has been operating since the spring, an official launch was held Thursday night to coincide with a three-day workshop that hopes to build a framework for international collaboration in the future.
Faber said the Hellenistic Age has often been overlooked because it wasn’t the time of classical Athens, and it wasn’t the Roman Empire. But more and more, scholars are recognizing its importance — and its historic similarities to the globalization occurring in today’s world.
“It is a period in which precedents were set, or parallels created, that apply today,” Faber said. “The world view, the perspective of people, changed dramatically.”
The institute’s steering committee consists of six faculty members from UW’s Department of Classical Studies who have research interests in the period, Faber said. His specialty lies in the literature and language of the time.
There are already numerous research associates from UW and abroad with a connection to the institute, and Faber said it plans to embark on a number of collaborative projects and publications with other academic centres. There are also hopes to raise funds to support a chair for the institute and to attract visiting researchers.
The institute is developing a resource database and will also launch an online journal in the near future.
- via New Waterloo institute to study a neglected period of history – the Hellenistic Age | The Record.
… which is interesting, given the reports a short while ago that Greek at Wilfrid Laurier — with whom Waterloo shares ‘teaching’ — is threatened. How does this work? Or do the powers that be at WLU figure this Hellenistic Studies thing will pick up the slack and save them (WLU) some money?
rogueclassicism 