On Tuesday, May 20, Dr. James Lohmar gave an invited public lecture at the University of California Riverside, under the title “Gore Caesars: Toward a History of Horror.” This summer Dr. Lohmar has been a Mullen Fellow at the University of California Riverside. As a Fellow he has been conducting research in the Eaton archive, known for its holdings on the Fantastic in the Arts, including the horror genre and comics. His research in the Eaton Collection is on the coverage of horror cinema in such publications as Famous Monsters of Filmland, Cinefantastique, and Gore Creatures.

The annual conference for the Southern Association for the History of Medicine and Science is being held in St. Louis, February 27-March 1, 2014. This year Classics will be well represented. Dr. Gentile will present her research in a paper, “Food, Medicine, or Drug: Understanding Greek Kykeon,” and her student Ryan Simpson will also present his work, “The Transformation of Roman Medicine Examined with Dynamic Systems Theory.”

This year Classical Charleston and the Theodore Guérard Lecture Series will bring to campus three renowned scholars on citizenship and democracy: Dr. Deborah Boedeker (Brown University), Dr. Josiah Ober (Stanford University), and Kurt Raaflaub (Brown University).

Citizenship in a Democracy: Ancient Greece and Beyond

More than 2000 years after the foundation of the world’s first democracy in a small city-state called Athens, there are still lessons we can learn from it. Greek political culture, which intersected with the overlapping spheres of religion, war, and social values, has left an enduring legacy that continues to affect the way we formulate our questions and confront our challenges.

Schedule of Events.Democracy

The Departments of Classics and History at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill have invited Dr. Noelle Zeiner-Carmichael to present her research in public lectures there(February 17-18, 2014). Her talk, based on her recent book, is titled, “The Making of Roman Letters.”

This Thursday (Feb. 6, 4:00PM, RAND 301A) Dr. Jim Newhard will present, “Visualizing the Past: Recent Developments in Archaeoinformatics at the College of Charleston.” Dr. Newhard will address how recent theoretical and methodological shifts within the field of archaeology have introduced new processes for understanding the past. These shifts will be placed within the context of recent, ongoing, and future work at the College of Charleston that have been geared towards understanding the rural Medieval landscape of central Anatolia and prehistoric landscape of the Mycenaean homeland.

For the Schedule of Meetings and Events, see the link below. The Classics Club offers students the opportunity to interact with others who share their interest in the Greco-Roman world. Any student is welcome to join the Classics Club and play an active role in all club activities. Meetings are regularly announced in Classics courses and on Facebook.  For further information, contact the current club president or the current faculty sponsor, Dr. Kristen Gentile.

Classics Club Schedule (spring semester 2014)

Student volunteers are working with Dr. Sterrett-Krause on a new study and publication project of ancient glass from Roman Carthage (modern Tunisia). The glass, excavated in the 1980s and 1990s by American and Tunisian teams at Carthage’s Circus and the neighboring Yasmina Cemetery, has never been systematically and completely studied. Students are working to organize the material according to its excavation context before beginning the detailed study. Future steps in the process will involve examining, cataloguing, drawing, and contextualizing the glass fragments; this study will provide further information about the uses of the sites and their dates, along with the production and use of glass in Roman Carthage. Volunteers are always welcome; no prior archaeological experience is necessary. Please contact Dr. S-K for more information.

The two leading national organizations for Classics, the AIA (Archaeological Institute of America) and APA (American Philological Association), will jointly hold their annual conference from January 2 -5. This year three of our students and three faculty members will be presenting research, directing colloquia, or chairing sessions, in addition to other professional activities:

Jami Baxley:  January 3, 11:00-3:00.  AIA Poster Session.  ‘The Use of Structured Light Scanning for the Study of the Linear B Deposits from Pylos, Messenia, Greece’ (with Dr. Newhard, B. Rennison, D. Nikassis, and K. Pluta)

Craig Garrison:  January 3, 11:00-3:00.  AIA Poster Session.  ‘A Catalog of Carriage Steps in the Historic District of Charleston: Paving the Way to Understanding the Historic Streetscape of Charleston’

Noelle Zeiner-Carmichael: January 3, 1:30 – 4:30.  APA Session 24 (Epistolary Fiction and Realities).  ‘Master of Letters:  Linguistic Competence in Fronto’s Correspondence’

James Newhard: January 4, 12:30 – 2:30.  Session Chair.  AIA Session 5D (Mapping the Roman World)

Alvaro Ibarra:  January 5, 8:30 – 11:30.  Colloquium Co-organizer.  AIA Session 7E.  ‘Composing Unity and Subverting Sovereignty in Iron Age and Roman Dacia’

Jeremy Miller:  January 5, 8:30 – 11:30.  AIA Session 7E. ‘The Evolution of Roman Encampments in Southern Dacia: An Analysis of Roman Operations and Military Fortifications Along the Upper Olt River Valley’ (with Dr. Ibarra)

Congratulations and good luck over the next few days!

On November 14, 2013, 16 of our students were inducted into Eta Sigma Phi, the National Classics Honors Society. Students must have earned an overall grade point average of at least 3.0 and have completed three Classics courses (including at least one Greek or Latin course) in which they earn at least a “B.” Congratulations to our 2013 fall class of Eta Sigma Phi!

At the Classics Club meeting, Wednesday, October 30 (5:00 PM: Randolph Hall 301B), Dr. James Lohmar will be scaring us all with the horrors of Lucan in his presentation: “Snakes on a Plain: Monsters and Art Horror in Lucan’s Bellum Civile.