The Spring brought a flurry of exciting encounters with secondary schools, the British Academy, and other higher education bodies.
We’ve had some fantastic fun this semester introducing secondary school students and sixth-formers to Royal Holloway through our Departmental Taster Days series. First up was our ‘Environment and the Humanities Taster’ (18th May). This was an opportunity for Year 12 students to experience university-style teaching with an environmental twist in Classics, as well as English, History, and Modern Languages. Then came our ever-popular, ‘Myth and Fantasy Taster Day’ (25th May) for Year 10s. We hoped to run ‘Classical Views on Modern Issues’ (19th July). However, the scorching weather made us reschedule for the Autumn! We want all students to be able to learn about how the Greeks and Romans treated issues, such as a ‘woman’s place’ in society, so-called ‘toxic masculinity’, and military ‘atrocities’, without too much of Sol Invictus’ grace. Please email our Recruitment and Outreach Lead, Richard Hawley (Richard.Hawley@rhul.ac.uk), to sign-up to our mailing list to find out more information.
One of our proudest achievements was the return of the Voice and Myth Initiative, a fun two-day school workshop based around the story of Eurydice and Orpheus (The Winston Churchill School (Woking) certainly had a brilliant experience). For any questions about the workshop or to organise a visit to your school, please email Efi Spentzou (efi.spentzou@rhul.ac.uk).
Sam Agbamu, our Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in Classics, and The Centre of the Reception of Greece and Rome (CPGR) hosted an online roundtable, ‘'Race' and Racism in the Roman World and its Reception’ (8th June). Through contributions by Nandini Pandey (Johns Hopkins University), Lylaah Bhalerao (New York University), Bet Hucks (Heidelberg University), and Sam, the panellists presented their thoughts on diversity in the Roman world and what this might mean for us today. As part of his Rome Award, Sam also recently published his thoughts on the legacies of colonialism in Rome and reflected on his time at the British School at Rome in the BSR blog.
In other exciting news, Christos Kremmydas spoke to Times Radio (02:43:48) on ‘What makes Volodymyr Zelenskyy such a great Orator?’, whilst The Centre for Oratory and Rhetoric (COR) attended the 20th Biennial Conference of Rhetoric (26th-29th May, Baltimore MA) hosted by The Rhetorical Society of America. We don’t play favourites, but the ‘Rhetorical Deception and Persuasion’ seminar (26th May) presented by our close friends at the ISHR was absolutely one of our favourites.
RHUL Classics presented a flurry of other lectures and seminars at national and international events this past semester. Liz Gloyn presented a lecture on Musonius Rufus, the Stoic-veggie-champion-of-beards, in 'Growing Up Is Hard To Do: Fathers And Adult Sons' (27th April) at The University of Manchester Research Seminar series. Liz also presented ‘Seneca and the Family’ (25th July) at The Association for Latin Teaching Classics Summer School, alongside Nick Lowe who presented ‘Aristotle’s Poetics: To Hollywood from a hole in the ground’ (27th July).
Back in May, however, CRGR hosted something (or someone) completely different. Jenn Ashworth read from her new novel, ‘Fell’, and spoke about “the spaces and places where novelistic practices had allowed to her trespass” whilst writing the book and its relationship to Ovid’s Baucis and Philemon in Metamorphoses 8.
Then came three exceptionally popular lectures by Hannah Platts, Richard Alston, and Jari Pakkenen between May and July. As a complement to her latest publication, Hannah presented ‘The Multisensory Roman House’ to The Ancient Architecture Discussion Group (Oxford, 27th May), whilst Richard talked about liminality and boundaries on the edges of the Roman Empire at the PGR Colloquium 2022 (RHUL Humanities, 31st May) through Tacitus' presentation of Germanicus and the AD 14 mutiny on the Rhine. And finally, Jari and Alice Clinch (Cornell) presented ‘Ancient plasters in 3D’ at the Digital Classicist London seminar (15th July).
To keep up to date with upcoming events, please follow our Twitter (@ClassicsRHUL) and/or Facebook (Classics Department at RHUL) pages. If you would like to invite a member of RHUL Classics to present a lecture, please click on their respective links and drop them an email.
