Courses Offerings Fall 1999
- Freshman Seminar THE BALKANS, PAST AND PRESENT Molly Greene
- Freshman Seminar HOMER – THE ILIAD AND THE ODYSSEY Robert Fagles
- HLS 101/MOG 101 ELEMENTARY MODERN GREEK Staff
- HLS 105/MOG 105 INTERMEDIATE MODERN GREEK Dimitri Gondicas
- HLS 213/COM 213 THE CULTURE OF DEMOCRACY Stathis Gourgouris
- HLS 361/HIS 447 Special Topics in Modern Greek Civilization: THE NAZI NEW ORDER AND ITS AFTERMATH: EUROPE IN THE 1940s Mark Mazower
- HLS 363/ VIS 344 Special Topics in Hellenic Studies: THE IDEA OF GREECE IN EUROPEAN CINEMA P. Adams Sitney
- ART 404 Seminar. Medieval Art: BYZANTINE MONASTERIES Slobodan Ćurčić
Regularly Offered Courses
ELEMENTARY MODERN GREEK
HLS 101/MOG 101
This course is the first part of the modern Greek language sequence regularly offered every year. It aims to set the foundations for acquiring a command of spoken and written modern Greek. The pace is intensive: one lesson in textbook each week, with accompanying daily exercises, and regular language laboratory attendance. Auditors welcome with instructor's permission. Staff Classes: 12:00-12:50 MTWTh
INTERMEDIATE MODERN GREEK
HLS 105/MOG 105
This course is the third part of the modern Greek language sequence offered every year. It will introduce students to themes in the Hellenic tradition through readings in modern Greek literature (Cavafy, Seferis, Ritsos). We will read newspaper articles, listen to Greek songs, and study documentary films. The emphasis will be on improving students' oral and written skills. Classes will be held entirely in Greek. Auditors welcome with instructor's permission. Dimitri Gondicas Classes: 12:00-12:50 MTWTh
One-Time-Only Courses
Freshman Seminars
Fall 1999
THE BALKANS, PAST AND PRESENT
What is the Balkan past and how does it relate to the terrible events that have gripped the region since the fall of the "Iron Curtain?" This is the question we will be grappling with throughout the course, as we study the region’s history and try to understand today’s newspaper headlines. Texts include: Misha Glenny, The Fall of Yugoslavia: The Third Balkan War; Ivo Andric, The Bridge on the Drina; Richard Cloggied, The Movement for Greek Independence, 1770-1821. Readings will include primary sources, documents, and personal testimonies. There will be screenings of films that deal with issues of nationalism, society, religion, and politics in the Balkans. Molly Greene
HOMER - THE ILIAD AND THE ODYSSEY
In this seminar we will read the Iliad and the Odyssey, Homer's two great poems that inaugurate the epic tradition in the West. We will also make some brief excursions into the work of writers from Virgil to Tolstoy, Tennyson, Joyce, and others, whose writings refer to Homer. We will focus on the Iliad and the Odyssey- in English translations, while introducing some elements of Homer's Greek - and we will keep many questions in mind throughout the semester: What is the balance between the two epics, one which is often called the poem of war, the other the poem of peace? How do they present us with contrasting yet complimentary visions of our lives? What are Homer's methods of presentation, his powers as an oral performer, a singer rather than the kind of writer we are used to? Who are Homer's heroines and heroes, and how does he dramatize Achilles, Odysseus, and Penelope through their words and actions? What is the relationship between their mortal world and the other, immortal world of the gods? Does Homer try "to justify the ways of god to man" - do the Iliad and the Odyssey offer us a theodicy? Or do the gods justify human life, as Nietzsche would see it, "by living it themselves - the only satisfactory theodicy ever invented?" Finally, why do these two epic poems endure? Why is Homer - who may have composed his works some 2,700 years ago - always with us, "our Homer," as we and older generations like to call the poet? There will be two short papers and a longer term paper, and each student will be asked to keep a reader's journal. Robert Fagles
THE CULTURE OF DEMOCRACY
HLS 213/COM 213
This course looks beyond democracy as a political system to the long-term culture that sustains it. With emphasis placed on the historical nature of democracy, both ancient and modern texts will be examined as traces of what might link together the world of the ancient polis with today's societies. Topics will include relations between law and community, justice and resistance, reason and myth, rights and the State. The underlying question will be the relation of literature and philosophy to the life of the citizen. We will study ancient texts, such as: Antigone, The Apology of Socrates, as well as excerpts from Thucydides and Plato's Republic. Modern texts will include Thomas More's Utopia, The Declaration of Independence, The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, Thomas Paine's Rights of Man, as well as contemporary essays on various relevant issues. Stathis Gourgouris Classes: 1:30-2:50 TTh
Special Topics in Modern Greek Civilization:
THE NAZI NEW ORDER AND ITS AFTERMATH:EUROPE IN THE 1940s
HLS 361/HIS 447
This seminar covers Nazi occupation policies and plans for Europe, especially the Balkans, including political, economic and racial aspects of the Nazi New Order, and the Final Solution of the Jewish Question. It sets the Holocaust in the broader context of Nazi population policies and racial engineering, and views the internal conflicts triggered off by the war in the light of longer-term ideological, class and ethnic divisions in European societies. We will explore the impact of war and its aftermath on individuals as well as states, on ordinary people as well as elites, on children and adults. Sources will include many primary materials and documents, published and unpublished and students will be strongly encouraged to undertake archival research of their own. Although there will be some focus on the Balkans and Greece in particular, we will also view the decade across Europe as a whole. Topics: Daily life under German rule, resistance, collaboration, social dislocation, postwar upheaval, Greek civil war, and origins of the Cold War. Mark Mazower Seminar: 1:30-4:20 T
Special Topics in Hellenic Studies:
THE IDEA OF GREECE IN EUROPEAN CINEMA
HLS 363/VIS 344
This course will explore the influence and imagining of Greek culture in European films, including a number of films and texts in which Greek directors have represented Hellenic history and culture. Topics: Representations of Classical tragedy in film; German culture and Greek thought; post-war Greece and the flowering of Greek cinema since the 1970s. Readings include texts by Sophocles, Plato, Euripides, and Nietzche, as well as articles on modern Greek and Balkan history. There will be weekly screenings of films by major European filmmakers (Rossellini, Straub, Pasolini, Angelopoulos, Cacoyannis, and others). The visit of the avant-garde filmmaker Robert Beavers (short-term fellow in Humanities and Hellenic Studies) who has shot many films in Greece on Greek themes, will be central to the course. Other guest speakers will focus on Greek history, literature, and culture. P. Adams Sitney Seminar: 1:30-4:20 W
Seminar. Medieval Art
BYZANTINE MONASTERIES
ART 404
This seminar will focus on some aspect of the history, architecture, and art of Byzantine monasteries. Please consult the instructor for further details. Slobodan Ćurčić Seminar: TBA
Courses of Related Interest
ART 202 Greek Art: Ideal Realism William A. P. Childs
ART 305/ARC 323 Greek and Roman Architecture Theodore L. Shear, Jr.
CLA 208/ENG 208 Origins and Nature of English Vocabulary Joshua T. Katz
CLA 212/HUM 212 Classical Mythology Richard P. Martin
CLA 502 Survey of Selected Greek Literature: Philostratos and the Eikones Ruth H. Webb
COM 542 The Classical Tradition: Modernity - Homer and the Modern Robert Fagles
HUM 205/COM 205 The Classical Roots of Western Literature Andrew L. Ford
HUM 216w From Antiquity to the Middle Ages: Literature and the Arts Theodore K. Rabb, Richard P. Martin, David Chamberlain
HUM 217w From Antiquity to the Middle Ages: History, Philosophy and Religion David Chamberlain, Theodore K. Rabb, Richard P. Martin
MUS 505 Studies in Comparative Musicology: Songs of the Spirit: World Traditions of Religious Chant Peter Jeffery
NES 433/HIS 433 The Near East and the Eastern Question since 1815 M. Sükrü Hanioglu
NES 437/HIS 337 The Ottoman Empire, 1300-1800 Heath W. Lowry
PHI 205/CLA 205 Introduction to Ancient Philosophy Christian Wildberg
PHI 300 Plato and His Predecessors John M. Cooper
REL 343 Jews, Gentiles, and Christians in the Ancient World John G. Gager, Jr.