Ancient Societies and Culture
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Terra Cotta Warriors |
The MA program in Ancient Societies and Cultures is designed for students whose interests go beyond a particular region or period in the ancient world or who wish to develop a wider critical framework from which to study a subject, region, or period. Students in this program are particularly encouraged to incorporate inter- and cross-disciplinary approaches in their education and research. The scope of the program allows students to pursue, for instance, advanced comparative studies in Greek, Roman and ancient Israelite historiography; cross-linguistic studies; ancient Mediterranean cross-cultural studies; research in ancient Indian and Hellenic and Roman contacts; ancient China; and comparative studies in ancient religions, societies, polities, built spaces, and visual cultures.
Students will be able to develop their personal research interests and critical skills by taking advantage of the broad range of expertise in the Department of History and Classics with respect to the ancient world. Areas of faculty expertise include Ancient History and Historiography; Classics; Ancient Religions; Late Antique and Early Medieval Europe; Archaeology and Material Culture of the Ancient World; Historical and Archaeological Theory and Methodology; and Latin, Greek, and ancient Hebrew Languages and Literatures.
For additional information contact Prof. Margriet J. Haagsma or check out our Facebook page.
Our fields of graduate study in Ancient Societies and Cultures include the following:
Geographic:
- Ancient Mediterranean (Fracchia, Haagsma, Harris, Hijmans, Kemezis, Lynn-George, MacFarlane, Mackay, Nagel, Pownall, Rossiter, Stewart)
- Late Antique/early Medieval Europe (Braun, Hijmans, Kitchen)
- The Ancient Near East (Ben Zvi, Landy, Stewart)
- Ancient and early Medieval India (Parasher-Sen)
- Ancient and early Imperial China (Jay)
Thematic:
- Archaeology and material culture (Fracchia, Haagsma, Hijmans, Parasher-Sen, Rossiter)
- History/Historiography (Ben Zvi, Braun, Jay, Kemezis, Kitchen, Landy, MacFarlane, Mackay, Parasher-Sen, Pownall)
- Religion (Ben Zvi, Braun, Hijmans, Kitchen, Landy, Parasher-Sen)
- Language and literature (Ben Zvi, Harris, Jay, Kemezis, Lynn-George, MacFarlane, Mackay, Nagel, Pownall, Stewart)
- Cultural and intellectual history (Ben Zvi, Braun, Harris, Hijmans, Jay, Kemezis, Kitchen, Lynn-George, MacFarlane, Mackay, Parasher-Sen, Pownall)
- Economic and social history (Fracchia, Haagsma, Parasher-Sen, Rossiter)
- Historical linguistics (Mackay, Stewart)
- Gender (Parasher-Sen, Stewart)
Research Infrastructure
In addition to regular graduate courses, the program offers a team taught-course (CLASS 499/599 and HIST 494/699) in which most of the faculty involved in the program participate. It tackles a broad theme encompassing the great variety of research approaches present in our Department. The theme for the 2010/2011 academic year is Urban Dreams and Realities: An Interdisciplinary Course on Cities in Ancient Cultures. The Department will also host an international conference on this theme in Fall 2011. Students in the program will be encouraged to participate and offer presentations.
Our excellent research library, regularly ranked second in Canada (Maclean’s) and in the top 25 in North America, is a strong attraction for students and faculty alike. Both language training (Latin, ancient Greek, biblical Hebrew, Sanskrit, classical Chinese) and courses in reading a variety of ancient scripts are available on campus, taught by faculty in the Department of History and Classics or other departments.
Faculty members’ areas of research and graduate supervision:
Ehud Ben Zvi (Ph.D. Emory)
Hebrew Bible (historical-critical studies), intellectual history of and constructions of the past in ancient Israel
Willi Braun (Ph.D. Toronto)
Early Christian thought, social formation of early Christian associations
Helena Fracchia (Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley)
Pre-Roman and Roman Italy, settlement development, land use, field survey
Margriet Haagsma (Doctoraal examen Groningen)
Greek archaeology, archaeology of domestic space, social and economic history of Hellenistic Greece
John Harris (Ph.D. Illinois)
Greek language, literature, and philosophy
Steven Hijmans (Ph.D. Groningen)
Roman art and archaeology, Roman religion
Jennifer Jay (Ph.D. Australian National)
Ancient and early Imperial China
Adam Kemezis (Ph.D. Michigan)
Roman literature and history, ancient historiography, Greek literature of the Roman Empire
John Kitchen (Ph.D. Toronto)
Christianity in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, Latin hagiographic literature, biblical interpretation
Francis Landy (Ph.D. Sussex)
Hebrew Bible (literary studies), ancient Judaism
Michael Lynn-George (Ph.D. Cambridge)
Greek language and literature, Homeric epic
Kelly MacFarlane (Ph.D. Alberta)
Greek and Latin literature, Greek music, Persian wars
Christopher Mackay (Ph.D. Harvard)
Greek and Latin literature, Roman history and historiography, witchcraft
Rebecca Nagel (Ph.D. Harvard)
Latin literature, the Classical tradition in England
Aloka Parasher-Sen (Ph.D. London)
Ancient and early Medieval Indian History to 1200 AD
Frances Pownall (Ph.D. Toronto)
Greek history and historiography, Greek language and literature
Jeremy Rossiter (Ph.D. Alberta)
Archaeology of the Roman provinces
Selina Stewart (Ph.D. Cornell)
Greek and ancient Near Eastern literature, historical linguistics, queer theory
Fictional examples of possible paths to an MA in Ancient Societies and Cultures
Corinna received a BA in Classical studies. During her undergraduate years she had training in Classical languages and literature, ancient history, and archaeology of the Mediterranean. Her minor was in Near Eastern cultural history. Corinna became interested in the relationship between ancient agriculture (especially animal husbandry and pastoralism) and urban formation processes, and wrote her thesis on “Agricultural strategies and the development of ‘citizen states’ in Archaic Thessaly.” As part of her MA requirement in Ancient Societies and Cultures, Corinna plans to further explore her interest in the underlying social and economic processes of developing urban environments. She will compare the role of pastoralism in territory formation in Archaic Boeotia in ancient Greece with the “cattle raid” strategies of nomadic tribes and settling the land in ancient India. In preparation for this study, Corinna has taken Sanskrit, courses in ancient Indian history and archaeology, and advanced courses in ancient Greek and archaeological theory and method.
James received an BA in Religious Studies. His main area of interest was the Hebrew Bible. As he learned about these texts within their historical context, he noticed that he needed to develop a comparative social and cultural framework to better understand ancient Israelite history, the construction of its memories, how and why these books emerged, and ancient cultural poetics. He also understood that he needed that framework to better understand what some seemingly simple concepts in biblical texts (monotheism, for example) may have actually meant in ancient Israel. That is why he decided to earn his MA in Ancient Societies and Cultures. He plans to take courses in comparative ancient historiography and in Greek, Hellenistic, Near Eastern and Indian ancient societies, while continuing his studies in ancient Israelite history.