Course Schedule and Catalog

Long Title: FRESHMAN SEMINAR: SOCRATES: THE MAN AND HIS PHILOSOPHY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Socrates, the first moral philosopher, was convicted of impiety and executed by his fellow citizens. His influence on Western thought has been immense, though he left no writings. Readings from Plato's dialogues, with emphasis on the Apology and Gorgias. In addition to papers, each participant will make one presentation and lead one. Cross-list: FSEM 101.

Long Title: GREEK CIVILIZATION AND ITS LEGACY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: An examination of the literary, artistic, and intellectual achievements of classical Greek civilization from Homer through the golden age of classical Athens to the spread of Greek culture in the Hellenistic world. The influence of ancient Greece on Western culture will be a focus. Case studies in the later reception of classical Greek literature (e.g., tragedy), philosophy (e.g., Socrates), history (e.g., democracy), and art (e.g., Parthenon) will be examined. Cross-list: HUMA 109.

Long Title: ROMAN CIVILIZATION AND ITS LEGACY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will investigate central aspects of Roman civilization: politics, religion, law, oratory, private life, public entertainment, literature, and visual art and architecture. Through case studies, we will also examine cthe place of ancient Rome in the western imagination, and the influence of ancient Rome on later politics, literature, and art. Cross-list: HUMA 111.

Long Title: NO HAPPY ENDINGS: TRAGEDY IN LITERATURE AND FILM

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Tragedy stages the suffering and fall of a hero. It excites pity and fear. Why, then, do we take pleasure in tragedy? This course explores the importance of tragedy in Western culture through a reading of plays by Sophocles, Shakespeare, Racine, and Ibsen. Films include works by Robinson and Schlondorff. Cross-list: FREN 131, FSEM 131.

Long Title: HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY I

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Survey of the major philosophers and philosophical systems of ancient Greece, from Parmenides to the Stoics. Cross-list: MDST 201, PHIL 201.

Long Title: GREEK AND ROMAN DRAMA

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Greek: A reading and dramatic analysis of Aeschylus's "Oresteia" (three plays), Sophocles's "Oedipus the King", "Oedipus at Colonus", "Electra and Antigone"; The "Medea" "Orestes", and "Electra" of Euripides. Latin: A reading and analysis of the "Menaechmi" and the "Miles Gloriosus" of Plautus, the "Phormio" of Terencen and the "Medea" of Seneca. Cross-list: ENGL 209.

Long Title: HOMER AND VIRGIL AND THEIR RECEPTION

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will read Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid in translation and will examine case studies in the reception of those works in post-classical western literature and criticism.

Long Title: THE NOVEL IN CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Shipwrecks, romance, travel, warfare, debauchery, and a man metamorphosed into a donkey. All appear in ancient Greek and Roman prose fiction, examples of which we will read in translation. Topics will include the form's origins, whether the term "novel" adequately defines the texts, and the works' ancient readership.

Long Title: WOMEN IN GREECE AND ROME

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Survey of the depiction of women in Greek and Roman mythology, literature, and art. Includes a study of the lives of Greek and Roman women as evidenced by archaeological as well as literary materials. Cross-list: WGST 225.

Long Title: GREEK AND ROMAN SOURCES IN THE HISTORY OF OPERA

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: The aim of this course is to develop critical skills and new ideas about classical anitquity and western music of the last four centuries, with special reference to musical drama. This course takes a literary-historical approach to what has come to be known as opera. Among the major themes we will discuss are the complex admixture of factors which produced the earliest operas, the persistent influence of Ovid, the appeal of mythic Crete, Greek and Roman history, the centrality of pastoral poetry in the history of the genre, and recurrent efforts through musical-literary history since 1600 to 'reform' and correct 'abuses' in compositional style in poetry and music.

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Italian literature and culture from the early masters through the late Renaissance. Primary sources to be studied in historical context include Dante's Commedia, Petrarch's Canzoniere, and Boccaccio's Decameron, major writings by 15th-century humanists (Bruni, Bracciolini, Poliziano, Pico), and 16th-century works by Bembo, Ariosto, Michelangelo, Castiglione, and Tasso.

Long Title: CLASSICAL MYTHOLOGY: INTERPRETATION, ORIGINS, AND INFLUENCE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: We will read and analyze some of the most influential Greek myths (including their parallels and permutations in other cultures). Employing insights from a variety of theoretical approaches to myth, we will identify typical story patterns, characters, and events, and the values, anxieties, and aspirations for which they stand.

Long Title: ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Topics in the history of philosophy from the 4th century B.C. through the 14th century. Cross-list: MDST 301, PHIL 301.

Long Title: TEXT AS PROPERTY, PROPERTY AS TEXT: ACROSS THE AGES

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Examines forms and norms of authorship and ownership from antiquity to the present. What is an author? Is a text public or private property? What are the licit/illicit forms of rewriting and appropriating a text, and how are those forms defined? This class investigates historically these and other issues. Cross-list: ANTH 321.

Long Title: GREEK ART AND ARCHITECTURE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A chronological survey of sculpture, painting, and architecture of Greece, and the Aegean Islands, and Western Asia Minor from the Bronze Age through the Hellenistic period (3300-31 BC). Analysis of style, content, and purpose within the cultural and historical contexts. Cross-list: HART 312.

Long Title: ROMAN ART AND ARCHITECTURE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: A chronological survey of Roman sculpture, painting, and architecture from its Etruscan beginnings to the late Empire. Art and architecture of Rome and the provinces considered within their larger social, political, and urban contexts. Particular attention given to patronage, the relation between Roman and Greek art, and Rome's position as an artistic center. Cross-list: HART 315.

Long Title: DEMOCRACY AND POLITICAL THEORY IN ANCIENT GREECE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This course will consider how democracy arose and developed in classical Greece. The course will consider how Athenian direct democracy functioned and what are the differences between ancient and modern democracy.

Long Title: THE INVENTION OF PAGANISM IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Distribution Group: Distribution Group I

Credit Hours: 3

Description: This interdisciplinary course examines the development of the concept of "paganism" in the Roman empire during the first through seventh centuries AD. We will examine the mutually tolerant character of the many religions of the Roman world and see how the category of paganism was invented and applied by Christians to all the polytheists of the empire and beyond. Cross-list: HIST 316, RELI 316.

Long Title: THE AGE OF AUGUSTUS

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: After defeating Antony and Cleopatra the emperor Augustus restored stability to Rome, oversaw the expansion of the empire, and made Rome a capital city. Study of art and literature of this 'Golden Age' will address Augustus' construction of identity, imperial and non-imperial patronage, and the formation of Augustan ideology in Rome and the provinces. Cross-list: HART 320.

Long Title: SPECIAL TOPICS IN ANCIENT ART

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Independent Study

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Two week course in Rome that introduces major monuments of the city. Focuses on both the history and function of these monuments in antiquity and explores how their meaning has evolved in the post-classical world. Instructor Permission Required.Cross-list: HART 318. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: THE ORIGIN OF THE LANGUAGES OF EUROPE

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Languages as superficially different as English, Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit in fact all developed from a single "proto-language". This course will explore the following questions: What was this proto-language like? How do we know what it was like? What can we learn about its speakers on the basis of the words that have survived in the various daughter languages?

Long Title: EPIC AND NOVEL

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Why did novelists of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries allude to classical epic, and how did they transform the genre? We will address these questions, reading the Homeric and other ancient epics alongside such novels as Fielding's Tom Jones, Eliot's Middlemarch, and Joyce's Ulysses. Cross-list: ENGL 335.

Long Title: MYTHS OF OTHERWORLD JOURNEY

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Analysis and comparison of myths of "otherworld journey" in ancient, medical, and modern texts. Who are the typical tellers of and audiences for such tales, and how do they function both in their immediate and in their broader cultural contexts? All works read in English translation.

Long Title: THE QUEST FOR ORIGINALITY IN CLASSIC ART

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Seminar

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Seminar examines how modern interests in originality and related desires for original artworks have shaped classical art history. Course considers differences between ancient and modern notions of originality; the degenerative view of Roman art based on the copying of Greek originals; how the modern quest to reconstruct lost originals has impacted the way we see antiquity today. Cross-list: HART 416.

Long Title: SPECIAL TOPICS

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Independent work. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: SPECIAL TOPICS

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Lecture

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Independent work. Instructor Permission Required. Repeatable for Credit.

Long Title: SENIOR THESIS

Department: Classical Studies

Grade Mode: Standard Letter

Course Type: Research

Credit Hours: 3

Description: Open to classics majors in the final semester of study. Thesis, to be written on a topic of the student's choice in consultation with a member of the faculty. Instructor Permission Required.