General Considerations:
Each week of class will have a designated topic or topics for a short (2 or at most 3 pages) essay. Each of you must do four of these over the course of the semester. I leave the scheduling up to you, but everyone should do at least one from each of the three units (ethnicity, gender, religion) of the course. This means, most immediately, that you should do at least one during weeks 2-4. Do at least one, and possibly two, during weeks 5-10 (gender and sexuality), and another during the final weeks (11-14).
NB: once you have picked a topic, please make sure that you do that paper during the week in which it is assigned, not some later week – i.e. don’t turn in Week Five’s topic in Week Seven. You are welcome to suggest another theme you would like to write on, but please discuss it with me in advance, and again, please make sure that you do it in the week in which it is most relevant to what is being covered in class.
All of the topics can be addressed with reference to the week’s assigned readings. When citing readings that are on the syllabus, it is not necessary to supply formal footnotes and bibliography. Name of the text and page number will suffice, either in parentheses or in footnotes, e.g. Cartledge p.25. When citing an ancient text such as Herodotus, Aristotle, or Tacitus, please use Book and Paragraph/Section numbers rather than page numbers, since there are many different translations of these texts in print and your copy may not match mine. Example: Herodotus III.52. Do likewise for texts you read online which don’t have clearly marked pages. If you do wish to use additional sources not on the syllabus (there is no expectation that you do so) then please give a full bibliographic reference for these. For an online source, give the full URL.
In grading these essays, I will take into account both substance (make a convincing argument, support it with evidence) and style (clarity of presentation, good grammar and prose). Because of the shortness of the papers, I advise against long direct quotations. Make your point clearly and concisely.
For each week, the essay may be handed in during class on Thursday, or left in my mailbox in the History Dept. (145 Eggers Hall) no later than 3pm on Friday. Electronic submission of papers is also acceptable. Please save the file as .rtf (Rich Text Format) or as Word 6.0/95 or Word 97 and e-mail it to me at jmgaddis@maxwell.syr.edu by Friday afternoon. Please be sure to check your e-mail several hours after sending it, in case it gets garbled and I need to ask you to re-submit it.
Week Two: The Classical Polis.
The ancient Greeks are often referred to as the "founders" or "ancestors" of modern democracy and western traditions of freedom. Based on your readings so far, do you think ancient Greek society is an appropriate model for our own time? In what ways, if any, did Greek understandings of freedom and citizenship differ from ours?
Week Three: Greeks, Persians, and Orientalism.
Discuss the portrayal of the Persians in Herodotus. Can Herodotus be taken as an early example of "orientalist" writing? What similarities and/or differences do you see between Herodotus and the modern western writers discussed by Edward Said?
Week Four: Romans and Barbarians. Write on one of the following:
A. Consider Tacitus’ Germania as a product of an advanced society (the Roman Empire) imagining and stereotyping its less "civilized" neighbors (the Germans). In what ways does Tacitus consider the Germans inferior to the Romans? In what ways are they superior? Reading between the lines, what points (if any) do you think Tacitus might be trying to make about Roman society?
B. Based upon your reading of Geary and Amory, do you think that terms such as "tribe", "nation" or "ethnic group" can be usefully applied to the barbarian groups that replaced the Roman Empire in the west? If "ethnicity" does not accurately describe their sense of identity, what does?
Week Five: Gender and Sexuality in Ancient Greece.
Is gender a "useful category of analysis?" What, if any, are the differences between "women’s history" and "gender history" as explained by Joan Scott? Do you agree or disagree with her model, and why? What relevance might her ideas have to this week’s readings on women and gender in ancient Greece?
Week Six: Sexuality and Deviance in Ancient Rome. Write on one of the following:
A. Based on your reading of the Winkler article from last week and/or Petronius’ Satyricon, compare and contrast Greco-Roman conceptions of sexuality with those prevalent in our own society. Are modern paradigms of "sexual orientation" and labels such as "homosexual" or "heterosexual" useful in making sense of the sexual behavior of ancient Greeks and Romans? If not, what alternative classifications might be available?
B. Maud Gleason’s article discusses ancient beliefs about physiognomy, the idea that you can draw conclusions about a person’s inner nature or moral character by examining his/her physical appearance or body language. With particular reference to concepts of gender and sexuality, how do you see these ideas being employed by characters in the Satyricon? How does one distinguish "masculine" from "effeminate?" Can you "tell just by looking at ‘em?"
Week Seven: Women and Political Power.
Using one of the following examples of male historians writing about imperial women, discuss how and to what extent the author’s biases and/or the society’s prevailing gender ideologies shape his portrayal of his subject.
Either Tacitus on Messalina
Or Procopius on Theodora.
Week Eight: The Body in Ideology and Imagination.
The ancients believed many things about the human body that, in light of modern science and medicine, were downright wrong. To what extent did ideology and/or morality shape their views of anatomy? Pick one specific example to discuss.
Week Nine: Eunuchs and Martyrs. Write on one of the following.
A. Discuss the role of eunuchs (castrated men) in Roman and/or Byzantine societies. Where and how do they fit into the gender systems of these societies? What kinds of things do they do that might be thought of as "masculine" or as "feminine?" Do they fit into the category of "third sex/third gender" proposed by Herdt?
B. Based on your reading of the Martyrdom of Perpetua, discuss the ways in which different categories of identity feature in the story. How does Perpetua construct her own identity, and what constructions do others seek to impose on her? How does she square her identity as a Christian with her Roman citizenship, and her status as a woman (wife, daughter, mother) in Roman society?
Week Ten: Gender and Sexuality in Early Christianity. Write on one of the following.
A. How does Christianity’s new emphasis on chastity and virginity perpetuate and/or challenge prevailing Greco-Roman ideas of sexuality and of appropriate roles for women? Discuss with reference to the Acts of Thomas and/or the Life of Pelagia.
B. The articles by Elizabeth Clark and Kate Cooper raise an important question: how much can we know about "real" women in antiquity, when nearly all ancient sources describing women were in fact written by men? How do we sort fact from stereotype and bias? Discuss with reference to the Life of Pelagia.
Week Eleven: Jewish Identity in the Greco-Roman World.
A. Based upon Tuesday’s readings, how did the Jews see themselves in relation to the Greco-Roman world around them? Is their situation best described in terms of ethnicity or of religion?
B. Based upon Pagels and the rest of Thursday’s readings, discuss early Christian views of Jews and Judaism. What role did these ideas about Jews play in the construction of Christian identity?
Week Twelve: Christians and Pagans.
A. How did early Christians see themselves in relation to Greco-Roman culture, or what we would call "classical civilization?" Did they embrace it or reject it? In what ways, if at all, did attitudes change between the second century (Tatian and Bardaisan) and the fourth (Julian, John Chrysostom, and the rest of Thursday’s readings)?
B. How, according to John Chrysostom, should Christians raise their children? What similarities and/or differences do you see with earlier Greco-Roman thinking on physiognomy, gender roles, sexuality, the body?
Week Thirteen: Heretics.
A. The early Christians seem to have invented a new category of "other", the heretic or "enemy within." How did this new category of "deviance" overlap with more familiar ways of defining difference, e.g. gender (Burrus) or body language (Shaw)? What methods could a Christian use to identify and resist these "wolves in sheep’s clothing?"
B. What connection, if any, do you see between the idea of "Satan" and the ways in which early Christians defined various groups as "other?"
Week Fourteen: Islam.
Islam is chronologically the third of the monotheistic religions, coming after Judaism and Christianity. Based upon this week’s readings, to what degree did early Muslims seek to identify themselves with their two predecessors? In what ways did Islam try to differentiate itself from Judaism and Christianity?