Graduate Student Symposia

In the spring of 2004, the Classics Department, with the generous support of the Grimshaw-Gudewicz Foundation, inaugurated a forum for graduate students to present work in progress to the community of scholars studying the ancient world at Brown.  Traditionally, all symposia are held at noon in the Classics Department Seminar Room, located in Macfarlane House.  The Classics Department Symposiarchs, with the help of their peers, organize and execute all symposia.

2022-2023 Symposiarchs

Maggie Danaher, Clare Kearns

Presenters

Hannah Silverblank (Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Classics and Comparative Literature and the Cogut Institute for the Humanities)

"Hephaestean Craftsmanship and 'Crip Technoscience'"

[April 14, 2023]

Caitlin Fennerty

"Bacchylides' Dithyrambs Revisited: A New Formalist and Thematic Approach" (Prospectus Talk)

[March 17, 2023]

Kiran Mansukhani 

"The Reactionary Plato of Kwame Nkrumah's Consciencism"

[March 10, 2023]

 

 

 

Past Symposia

2021-2022

Grad Symposiarchs

Benjamin Driver, Clare Kearns

Presenters

2020-2021

Grad Symposiarchs

Benjamin Driver, Michael Ziegler

The 2020-2021 Graduate Symposia series was limited due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Presenters

Fiona Sappenfield

"Umoris Luxuria: the Role of the Sea in Latin Literature"
[Friday, March 26, 2021]

Christopher Jotischky-Hull

"The Latin Poetics of Modern Greek Prose Literature, 1820-1960"
[Friday, February 19, 2021]

Ella Grunberger-Kirsh

"'Despicable Creatures:' Domestic attendants and the making of text, c. 350-700 CE"
[Thursday, February 11, 2021]

2019-2020

Grad Symposiarchs

Benjamin Driver, Michael Ziegler

 

Presenters

Marko Vitas

“Pindar's Losers and Name Replacement as a Stylistic Device in Pindar's Odes"
[Friday, March 6, 2020]

Erika Valdivieso

“Virgil and the Virgin of Guadalupe" (Job Talk)
[Friday, February 7, 2020]

Christopher Jotischky-Hull

“The Crowning of the Lyre: Andréas Kálvos and the Appropriation of Pindaric Imagery in Nineteenth-Century Greek Diasporic Poetics"
[Tuesday, October 29, 2019]

Alvaro Pires

“A Fiction of Nature and the Nature of Fiction: Allegory in the Physiologos"
[Thursday, October 10, 2019]

Avi Kapach

“The Palinodes of Euripides: Inconsistency and Self-Contradiction in Greek Tragedy" (Prospectus Talk)
[Thursday, September 26, 2019]

2018-2019

Grad Symposiarchs

Benjamin Driver, Ella Grunberger-Kirsh

 

Presenters

Avi Kapach

“Déjà vu and False Phantoms: Politics and Intertextuality in Ovid's Myth of Anna Perenna (Fasti 3.543-656)”
[Wednesday, May 8, 2019]

Sam Butler

“Inscribing Communities Across the Mediterranean: A Comparative Approach to the Lycian and Oscan Alphabets in the First Millenium BCE”
[Friday, March 1, 2019]

Christopher Jotischky-Hull

“A 'Modern' Greece?: The Classical Legacy and the Enlightenment on Zakynthos”
[Friday, February 15, 2019]

Alvaro Pires

“Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: Fact, Fiction, and Truth in the Physiologos”
[Friday, January 25, 2019]

Stephany Hull

“The Interdisciplinary Teacher: Augustine's 'Contra Academicos' as a Dialogue about Rhetoric”
[Friday, December 7, 2018]

Prof. Leni Ribeiro Leite (University of Espirito Santo, Brazil)

“Teaching Latin with Early Texts: A Round-Table”
[Friday, November 16, 2018]

2017-2018

Grad Symposiarchs

Ella Grunberger-Kirsh,  Alvaro Pires​

 

Presenters

Gaia Gianni

“Death and Family in Imperial Rome: Patterns of Commemoration in Sepulchral Inscriptions”
[Friday, April 27, 2018]

Ella Grunberger-Kirsh

“Et bene mihi erat cum eis: The Place of Music in Late Antique Life-Writing”
[Friday, April 6, 2018]

Dr. Arlene Holmes-Henderson (University of Oxford)

“Classics in the UK Elementary & High Schools: The Dawn of a New Era?”
[Friday, October 20, 2017]

2016-2017

Erika Valdivieso
“The Virgilian Tradition in Latin America”
[Friday, May 12, 2017]

Stevie Hull
“The Model Teacher: Friendship and Pedagogy in Augustine's Dialogues”
[Thursday, May 11, 2017]

William Jacobs
“Reshaping the Battlefield: Aftermath Narratives in Roman Historiography”
[Friday, April 21, 2017]

Michiel van Veldhuizen
“Where the Woozle Wasn't": Tracking Monsters Across Land, Sea, and Literature”
[Wednesday, March 15, 2017]

Trigg Settle
“Trauma and the Interpretation of Tragedy: Studies in Ancient Greek Theater and Drama”
[Friday, October 14, 2016]

Sjoukje Kamphorst (University of Groningen)
“Carving Communities in Stone: Inscriptions as a Medium of Coordinating Cooperation”
[Friday, October 7, 2016]

2015-2016

Michiel van Veldhuizen
“Divining Disaster: Signs and Symptoms of Catastrophe in Ancient Greek Culture and Society”
[Friday, April 29, 2016]

Dominic Machado
“Slaves, Soldiers and Citizens: Roman Responses to Protest, 200-50 BCE”
[Friday, March 18, 2016]

Rachel Philbrick
“Utopian Rome in Ovid's Externalized View from Exile”
[Thursday, December 10, 2015]

Dasha Resh
“Early Metaphraseis in Byzantine Hagiography (c. 800 - c. 1000)”
[Friday, October 16, 2015]

2014-2015

Tara Mulder
“He said, He said, She said: Citationality and the Search for Women in Ancient Rome”
[Friday, January 23, 2015]

Darrel Janzen
“Tacitus and the Spaces of Imperial Court Society”
[Monday, December 15, 2014]

Tara Mulder
“Adult Breastfeeding in Ancient Rome”
[Friday, December 12, 2014]

Jen Swalec
“Epigraphic Evidence for Sacred Textiles: A Comparison of Inscriptions from Miletos and Andania”
[Friday, December 12, 2014]

Scott DiGiulio
“Monumenta rerum ac disciplinarum? Varro's Reception and the Case of Gellius' Noctes Atticae Book 3”
[Monday, December 8, 2014]

Jen Swalec
“The Textile as a Sacred Gift in Antiquity”
[Wednesday, October 8, 2014]

Rachel Philbrick
“Credibility amidst the Incredible: Hyperbole and Persuasion in Ovid's Exile Poetry”
[Friday, September 26, 2014]

E. Perot Bissell
“Subsumption, Totalization & Primacy in the Narratives of Ancient Greece, Rome & the Indian Subcontinent”
[Friday, September 19, 2014]

2013-2014

Justin Byrd
“Highest Good or Strong Poison: The Rhetorical Construction of Patronage in the Brahmin Tradition”
[Friday, May 2, 2014]

D. Thomas
“Inscribing Roman Eleusis: Connecting Representations and Representing Connections”
[Wednesday, March 12,2014]

M. Dobrzanski (Wroclaw)
“Military command in Hellenistic Thessalian Communities”
[Wednesday, March 5, 2014]

D. Grzesik (Wroclaw)
“Worshipping Heroes: Inscribed Honors in Post-Classical Delphi”
[Friday, March 7, 2014]

Mitchell Parks
“Paradoxical Praise: Isocrates and Political Encomium”
[Friday, February 28, 2014]

J. Kurz
“The Carthaginians in Southern Iberia”
[Friday, February 21, 2014]

Scott DiGiulio
“Aulus Gellius' Noctes Atticae Book II and the Didactic Logic of Miscellany”
[Wednesday, December 11, 2013]

Mitchell Parks
“Mercenary Wisdom:  The Role of Simonides in Xenophon's Hieron”
[Friday, December 6, 2013]

Joe McDonald
“Out of Bounds: Reassessing IG II2 204”
[Friday, November 22, 2013]

Tara Mulder
“Don't Call the Doctor: De-Medicalizing Childbirth in the Roman Empire”
[Wednesday, November 20, 2013]

Ann McDonald
“I'll Tell You When I'm Older: Comparing Plutarchs in De E Apud Delphos and Amatorius”
[Friday, October 11, 2013]

2012-2013

Matthew Wallenback
“Choral Visions: Studies in Greek Choral Poetry and Performance”
[Friday, May 17, 2013]

Adrianne LaFrance
“The Epitaph for Bion: Agonism and Fictional Biography as Literary Criticism in Late Bucolic”
[Friday, May 10, 2013]

Darrell Janzen
“Tacitus’ Use of Space in Valerius Asiaticus’ Cubiculum-Trial before Claudius in 47 CE”
[Friday, May 3, 2013]

Byron MacDougall
“Gregory of Nazianzus and Festival Rhetoric”
[Friday, March 1, 2013]

Bryan Brinkman
“Popular Expression and Imperial Control: Acclamation in the Roman Empire”
[Friday, February 22, 2013]

Scott DiGiulio
“Aulus Gellius, the Noctes Atticae, & the Literary Logic of the Miscellany Under Roman Empire”
[Friday, February 1, 2013]

Ann Rabe
“Breaking the Man: The Development of ad hominem Violent Language in Rome”
[Friday, December 14, 2012]

Joe Macdonald
“Bad Religion: Conceptualizing Sacrelige in Ancient Greece”
[Friday, December 7, 2012]

Jen Swalec
“Literary Criticism Before the Frogs: Earlier Aristophanic Characterizations of ‘Euripides’”
[Friday, November 30, 2012]

Ann McDonald
“Inquiry and Identity in Plutarch’s Platonic Dialogues”
[Friday, November 16, 2012]

Barbara Blythe
“Petronius’ Satyrica: Anovel of Mystic Initiation”
[Friday, October 26, 2012]

Tara Mulder
“ἀρίστη μαῖα: Claims of Expertise and Authority in the 2nd Century CE”
[Friday, October 19, 2012]

Mitchell Parks
“Measured Praise: The Politics of Encomium in Classical Athens”
[Friday, September 28, 2012]

2011-2012

Chris Geggie
[Friday, April 20, 2012]

Karen Jones & Ann McDonald
[Friday, March 23, 2012]

Scott DiGiulio & Joe McDonald
[Friday, March 9, 2012]

Byron MacDougall
[Friday, October 7, 2011]

Emily Kneebone
[Friday, September 23, 2011]

E. Perot Bissell
[Friday, September 16, 2011]

2010-2011

Karen Kelly
[Friday, April 29, 2011]

Melissa Sassin
[Friday, April 22, 2011]

Matthew Wallenback
[Friday, April 15, 2011]

Christopher Geggie
[Friday, February 18, 2011]

Tara Mulder
"The Chorus of Initatiates in Aristophanes' Frogs: Their Thematic and Mediatory Roles in the Structure of the Plot"
[Friday, November 5, 2010, at 12:00 pm in Macfarlane House, Room 101 - 48 College Street] 

Leo Landrey
"Valerius Flaccus' Argonautica and the Limits of Unlimited Power"
[Friday, September 21, 2010, at 12:00 pm in Macfarlane House, Room 101 - 48 College Street]

2009-2010

Leo Landrey
"Clades Lemnia, Clades Romana: Valerius Flaccus and Contemporary History"
[Friday, April 30, 2010, at 12:00 pm in Macfarlane House, Room 101 - 48 College Street]

Timothy Haase
"Watching Satire Unravel: Mode and Genre in Juvenal's Satires"
[Monday, May 3, 2010, at 12:00 pm in Macfarlane House, Room 101 - 48 College Street]

Bryan Brinkman
"Graffiti from Roman Italy: a Study in Civic Religion"
[Wednesday, March 10, 2010]

Scott DiGiulio
"Lucian's (?) Use of Herodotus and Rearticulation of Hellenic Identity in the De Dea Syria"
[Wednesday, March 3, 2010]

Lauren Donovan
"Literary and Ideological Memory in the Octavia"
[Friday, February 19, 2010]

Mark Thatcher
"Greek Identity in Hannibalic Italy"
[Friday, December 11, 2009]

Timothy Haase
"Looking at 'Atomistic' Repetition in the De Rerum Natura of Lucretius"
[Thursday, November 5, 2009] 

Robin McGill
"Prophecy, Identity, and Authority in Early Christian Latin Hymns"
[Thursday, September 24, 2009]

2008-2009

Cynthia Swanson 
"Ars Makes Exile Poetry" 
[Wednesday, April 15, 2009]

Asya Sigelman 
"Myth-introducing Relative Pronouns and the Chronological Vortex in Pindar's Pythian 9" 
[Friday, April 3, 2009]

Leo Landrey 
"Finding Ovid in Silver Epic: Phineus and Prometheus in Argonautica 4 " 
[Saturday, March 14, 2009]

David Yates 
"Remembering the Persian War Differently " 
[Saturday, March 14, 2009]

Mark Thatcher 
"Tiers of Identity in Greek Sicily and Italy" 
[Monday, March 2, 2009]

Leo Landrey
"Was Hercules a Pompeian? Lucan's Role in Valerian Recuperation"
[Friday, February 13, 2009]

Timothy Haase
"Callimachus Pseudopatôr: The Relationship of Lies and Poetry in the Corpus of Callimachus"
[Thursday, December 11, 2008]

2007-2008

Lauren Donovan
"Two Types of doctrina: The Limits of Conventional Learning in Apuleius' Metamorphoses"
[Thursday, April 17, 2008]

Jennifer Yates
"Apuleius' Novel Tragedy" 
[Thursday, April 17, 2008]

Lauren Donovan
"Medea Bound: The Role of Prometheus in Apollonius' Argonautica"
[Saturday, March 15, 2008]

Leo Landrey
"Fortunatus Transformed: Pagan Elegy in Christian Poetry"
[Saturday, March 15, 2008]

David Yates
"The Rediscovery of the Roman Republic in 11th and 12th Century Byzantine Historiography"
{Wednesday, March 19, 2008]

Asya Chernyak
"Time, Sunrise, and Telos in Aeschulus' Agamemnon"
[Friday, December 7, 2007]

2006-2007

Philip Walsh 
[Thursday, March 22, 2007]

Robin McGill 
"'Coming' to Faith through Late Antique Latin Poetry"
[Friday, February 23, 2007]

Jennifer Thomas 
"Seven Soldiers, Seven Snakes: A Closer Look at Lucan, Bellum Civile 9.619-937 "
[Friday, December 7, 2006]

Jeffrey Hunt 
"Poetry and Oratory in Tacitus' Dialogus de Oratoribus"
[Friday, October 20, 2006]

2005-2006

Jennifer Thomas 
"Concrete Anachronism in Lucan's Bellum Civile "
[Wednesday, March 22, 2006]

Robin McGill 
"Why Three Eide? Rethinking Aristotle's Types of Rhetoric in Terms of Action"
[Friday, December 9, 2005]

Benjamin Low
"Lucretius on Wild Beasts in War, and the Perversion of Progress"
[Friday, December 9, 2005]

Kevin Patterson 
"Virgilian References in the Writings of Aldhelm"
[Friday, December 2, 2005]

Asya Chernyak
"The Two Faces of Virgil's Dido"
[Friday, October 21, 2005]

2004-2005

Miryana Vassileva 
"Enigmatic Speech in Alcman's Louvre Partheneion"
[Wednesday, May 11, 2005]

Michael MacArthur
"Exiled from History: Livy on the Soldiers of Cannae"
[Friday, May 6, 2005]

Carrie Thomas 
"Hamilla in Euripides' Helen"
[Friday, March 18, 2005]