i think it's really funny that i haven't touched this blog for a whole year now. just over, actually. that should tell you what the past year has been like.
so i'm a year older, and the world has gone around the sun another time. how has the world of classics changed in the interim?
well, hmm. not sure we can measure it in cataclysmic events. but two things that i have noticed in particular:
[a] in the humanities outside of classics, people feel more than ever that theory is 'over.' [in practical terms, i think this means primarily 'poststructuralism' and in particular 'deconstruction.'] but just as it took quite awhile for literary theory to percolate into classics, i imagine it will take it awhile to leach out of it as well. [strictly speaking, i suppose, this is a way in which classics has not changed over the past year.]
[b] a trend that i think has continued [and in fact burgeoned] in classics is the visual turn. we continue to see an emphasis on the exploitation of classical civilizations in the visual media. this past year has seen the premieres of TROY, ALEXANDER, and now -- on television -- ROME. from a pedagogical angle, i would say that students are more visual than ever in the way they process information. this is something i try hard to keep in mind as i teach.
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*I, Claudius* should be in that list, and it's been out for quite some time.
and indeed, in a sense, it *is* on the list -- it's been a regular on the syllabus of my CLCS 336 course for some time. i'm interested in what i call 'levels of mediation' -- the layers between us modern-day viewers and the historical events in that story. there's the ancient authors [in this case tacitus, suetonius, and several others]; the novels by robert graves; and the TV miniseries. but you can peel those apart and discover a number of *other* layers as well.
anyway, yes, i love that series, and my students do too. every time i screen it, there's invariably someone who comes up and says s/he is going to buy the whole set! it's that engaging.
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