Classical Studies Support

This week I’ve completed my service as a Judge on the Classics and Archaeology Panel at the Undergraduate Awards (I’ll be carefully avoiding spoilers, because the names of the winners aren’t due to be announced for another few days!).

 

 

It’s been a really interesting experience, not least because it’s encouraged me to question what I assume when I hear the words ‘undergraduate essay’. Some of the essays I read over the summer – sent from universities all over the world – did not at all fit my expectations.

I know what a top-scoring undergraduate essay looks like: I’ve read a lot of them over the last two decades, and written a few myself. A great undergraduate essay answers the question smoothly, incorporating all of the expected material as well as one or two unexpected extras. It has sound referencing and a thoughtful conclusion. It uses a judicious selection of primary material, discussed with insight; it covers the relevant secondary source debates and takes a position in relation to them.

But some of the essays I read weren’t like that. Some were powerful and passionate, driven not so much by the need to answer the question as by the desire to make a point and challenge perceptions. Others were highly innovative, leveraging the student’s own background (gender, ethnicity, experience) to find a new angle on an old question. A few were structured like a dissertation, with chapters and a contents page, setting out a nuanced argument based on a significant body of primary evidence. In some cases, only a bit more work would be needed to make the essays into publishable journal articles.

What impressed me most was the way these undergraduates were taking on received ideas with energy, conviction and a strong belief that they had something to contribute to the debate. It’s easy sometimes, as a tutor, to drift into the habit of thinking that an undergraduate degree is a sort of apprenticeship, a time for learning and acquiring formal skills which might form the foundation for more creative work later on. Judging the Undergraduate Awards has reminded me that students don’t have to wait until an MA or a PhD to find their voices, or to challenge authority with a powerful idea.

 

 

 

If you’d like to know more about the Undergraduate Awards, here’s the link; and for OU students, here’s a guidance sheet I’ve put together.

 

 

This week’s links from around the internet

 

 

From Classical Studies Support

One of last year’s Highly Commended entrants talks about the Undergraduate Awards – Classical Studies Support

 

News

Roman gold in a theatre – The Local 

On Greenland ice cores – Massive Science

Anointing antiquities in Athens – DW 

A Greek altar in Russia – TASS 

Experiencing the loss of antiquities in Brazil – Society for Classical Studies 

Tourism in Syria – The Media Line 

Encountering the past in Athens – The Guardian 

 

Comment and opinion

Madeline Miller on Circe – Elle 

Being a Jew in the Roman Empire – The Daily Beast 

Talking about Legonium – Antipodean Odyssey 

Influential Roman women – History Extra 

Myth in Assassin’s Creed – Ancient Origins

Sulpicia the reader – Lugubelinus

A Day in the Life of a Classicist – Society for Classical Studies 

Learning about Digital Humanities – Classical Fix

Greek female master potter – Science 

Pliny’s ghost story – Eagles and Dragons 

Thucydides and Spike Milligan – Sphinx 

The Roman invasion that didn’t happen? – Daily Mail 

Organising Homeric armies – Ancient World Magazine 

The past is another country – Le Temps Revient [and I already have the Loeb-sized pockets!]

Greek ‘facts’ – History Extra

Using new methods to see inside scrolls – Mental Floss 

Sappho and sexuality – Classical Wisdom Weekly

On the influence of ‘Reginaldus’ Foster – In Media Res

Attending Gladiator School in Rome – The Telegraph 

Poetry and Barbarians – The History Girls 

Pronouncing botanical Latin – The Guardian 

Visiting Morocco – A Don’s Life 

Hercules, zombies and the moon – Ancient Blogger 

Mark Zuckerberg on Augustus and world peace – CNBC 

More Morocco – A Don’s Life 

Seneca, Trump and opting out – Eidolon 

On scientists and the Odyssey – Forbes 

 

Podcasts, video and other media

Discussing the Iliad – In Our Time 

Making haste slowly – Ataraxia Alpha

Talking about Clodia – Emperors of Rome

Poor Laocoon – Ivy Crowned

Thinking about Classics and the alt-right – History Talk 

On fathers, sons and the Odyssey – The Art of Manliness 

Rome and rhetoric – Interventions 

Was Sappho a woman? – Gresham Lectures 

On Greek Epic – Ancient Greece Declassified 

Alexander’s logistics – Kings & Generals 

Antigone and feminism – BBC Ideas 

3D scanning of Athens – BBC Two

 

And finally…

The financial benefits of OU study – Wonkhe