Seen on the Classicists list (please direct any queries to the folks mentioned in the item and not to rogueclassicism):

A CELEBRATION OF CLASSICS: 2011 TRIENNIAL CONFERENCE IN CAMBRIDGE

From Monday 25 July to Thursday 28 July 2011 the Faculty of Classics in the University of Cambridge will once again host the Triennial Conference of Classical Studies. This Triennial has been given a radically revised format:

http://www.classics.cam.ac.uk/faculty/seminars_conferences/triennial_conference/speakers/

Working with a committee that includes representatives of sponsoring bodies (Societies for the Promotion of Hellenic and Roman Studies, British Schools at Athens and Rome), the organizers have been fortunate in attracting a large international cast of speakers, and have tried to cover most sub-disciplines within Classics and Ancient History in greater depth than in the past. The organizers are most grateful to the 145 scholars who have agreed to support this venture by giving, or responding to, papers; among these are Roger Bagnall, Anthony Grafton, Edith Hall, Stephen Hinds, Walter Scheidel, and Caroline Vout, who will give plenary lectures.

They are grateful also to the sponsors who have offered their financial support for this new venture: Cambridge University Press, the Cambridge Philological Society, the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies, the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies, Oxford University Press, Harvard University Press, Princeton University Press, Trinity College, Cambridge and the Institute of the Ancient World.

All our colleagues in the study of the ancient world are cordially invited to join us in this triennial national celebration of Classics in a year when we will all be needing to reaffirm the vitality and abiding value of the subject we love. For booking see:

http://www.classics.cam.ac.uk/faculty/seminars_conferences/triennial_conference/registration/

Seen on the Classicists list (please direct any queries to the folks mentioned in the item and not to rogueclassicism):

Please find below the revised Semester 2 programme of Classics Research Seminars at Edinburgh. All seminars take place on Wednesdays at 5.10pm in the Meadows Lecture Theatre, Ground Floor, Medical School, Teviot Place, Doorway 4, unless otherwise stated. All are welcome to attend. For further information please contact Ursula Rothe (ursula.rothe AT ed.ac.uk).

Edinburgh Classics Research Seminar 2010/11: Semester 2

19th January
Prof. STEPHEN MITCHELL (Exeter)
‘Caracalla in Ankara AD 215’

26th January
Dr. JAMES HOWARD JOHNSTON (Oxford)
‘Reflections on the last great war of antiquity 603-630’

2nd February
Dr. LISA HAU (Glasgow)
‘Tykhe in Polybius – new answers to an old question’

9th February
Prof. STEPHEN HALLIWELL (St. Andrews)
‘Is there a Greek concept of fiction?’

23rd February
Dr. JENNIFER INGLEHEART (Durham)
‘Speaking names: the significance of naming in Catullus’

2nd March
Prof. INEKE SLUITER (Leiden)
‘Free speech and the marketplace of ideas’

9th March
Prof. NICO ROYMANS (VU Amsterdam)
‘The Batavians between Germania and Rome. The emergence of a military people’

16th March
Dr. DYFRI J. R. WILLIAMS (British Museum)
‘Refiguring the Parthenon sculptures’

30th March
Dr. DENNIS PAUSCH (Giessen/Edinburgh)
Title tba

20th April
Dr. ROBERTA TOMBER (British Museum)
‘Rome’s eastern trade – from the Red Sea to the Bay of Bengal’

27th April
Dr. JANET DELAINE (Oxford)
‘Reflections on Trajan’s Pantheon’

Seen on the Classicists list (please direct any queries to the folks mentioned in the item and not to rogueclassicism):

Teaching uncomfortable subjects in the classics classroom
Fiona McHardy and Nancy Rabinowitz, editors

We invite submissions of abstracts for a volume on teaching uncomfortable
subjects in the classics classroom, to be submitted to Ohio State
University Press. International contributions are actively sought. The
volume is built around an APA workshop with the same name which took place
at the 2011 meeting. This workshop itself grew out of a panel at the
Feminism and Classics V conference, in particular the paper by Sharon James
(later published in Cloelia) on teaching rape in the classics classroom.
The topic of rape generated a great deal of interest, and the desire to
keep the conversation going led to further roundtables and panels in the UK
and the US.

But the issues are much broader than rape, and the APA workshop in 2011
expanded the discussion to encompass a wider range of issues potentially
uncomfortable for teachers or for students or for both, including crime,
pedophilia, domestic violence, abortion, suicide, homophobia, slavery, and
racial ‘jokes’ where some students will have had personal experiences that
might generate distress or make discussion difficult. The emphasis of the
session was on stimulating discussion to raise awareness of unforeseen
difficulties and to share strategies for dealing with those difficulties.
We would like to include that emphasis in this volume.

In the US there has been an effort, spurred on by the Ford Foundation’s
grants, to have what they call “difficult dialogues.” The program
description was aimed at classes “designed to promote academic freedom and
religious, cultural, and political pluralism on college and university
campuses in the United States.” But political topics are not the only ones
that provoke difficult dialogues. We welcome other ideas about how
classical texts might raise controversial issues and allow the opportunity
to discuss them.

Questions we will consider: what makes something difficult to talk about?
How much do we know about our students’ experiences? How much is it
appropriate for us to know? How much can we challenge our students in the
classroom when we are unsure of their experiences? Is it appropriate to
single out students to discuss topics related to their own experiences
(e.g. should we call on the one student of color to talk about race?) How
can we help students work through trauma without overstepping our bounds?
How can tutors be supported in dealing with crisis situations? What are the
personal and professional risks that we might run in opening up such topics
for conversation?

Please send a one-page abstract to f.mchardy AT roehampton.ac.uk or
nrabinow AT hamilton.edu by February 28, 2011; papers will be 5-6000 words in

length. We plan to send the completed volume to OSU by December 1, 2011.

Seen on the Classicists list (please direct any queries to the folks mentioned in the item and not to rogueclassicism):

Please find below the programme of the seminar on emotions and ancient Greek history at Oxford this term.

Emotions and Ancient Greek History

Chrysi Kotsifou and Georgy Kantor

Tuesdays, 5 pm, Lecture Theatre

Ioannou Centre for Classical and Byzantine Studies

66 St Giles, Oxford OX1 3LU

Week 1, 18 January: Chrysi Kotsifou (University of Oxford), ‘Womanly weakness and manly moderation: the use and abuse of pity in fourth century petitions.’

Week 2, 25 January: Simon Hornblower (University of Oxford), ‘Emotions and the Greek gods’

Week 3, 1 February: AngelosChaniotis (IAS, Princeton), ‘Emotional display in public life in the Hellenistic period’

Week 4, 8 February: Ed Sanders (Royal Holloway), ‘Approaching a nameless emotion: the construction of sexual jealousy in Classical Athens’

Week 5, 15 February: John Tait (University College London), ‘Osiris in a Whirlwind: looking for change in the representation of emotion in Egypt through two and a half millennia.’

Week 6, 22 February: Nicole Belayche (École pratique des hautes etudes), "The ‘possible’ body of the gods: from imitation to ritual confection of their nature"

Week 7, 1 March: David Frankfurter (Boston University), "Desperation and the Magic of Appeal: Representations of Women’s Emotions in the Voices of Magical Texts and Votive Images"

Week 8, 8 March: Lene Rubinstein (Royal Holloway), ‘Evoking anger through pity: portraits of the vulnerable and defenceless in Attic oratory’

Tip o’ the pileus to James Romm who passes along this link to a nice review article by Tom Holland of a number of recent books relating to Alexander the Great:

• Book Review: Books About Alexander the Great – WSJ.com.