News and Events
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News
KARSTEN RECEIVES HONORS, TO PRESENT PAPER
"It's best for this not to happen the same as it does in the comedies, when everyone finds out everything."
Seeking to understand the meaning behind young husband Pamphilus's single line from Terence's Hecyra, Alex Karsten's produced “The Noble Lie in Terence’s Hecyra,” a paper he will present during the Eta Sigma Phi panel discussion at the next American Philological Association and Archaeological Institute of America joint annual meeting.The purpose of his research, under the direction of Sharon L. James, was to discover why the three women at the end of the work "choose to hide a very brutal truth in order to help restore a societal and familial order that seems detrimental to their own interests." In the end, Karsten "found that this concept of the noble lie was not only found throughout the western philosophical tradition, but it was also a very useful key to understanding the befuddling end of this play," he said.
In addition to participating in the panel discussion, Karsten also was inducted into the Order of the Golden Fleece.
We congratulate Alex for his academic successes!
GRADUATE STUDENTS AWARDED DISSERTATION FELLOWSHIPS
Several of our graduate students are reaping the bounty of their scholarship this week. Patrick Dombrowski and Erika Weiberg both received Summer Research Fellowships from The Graduate School, which also granted Serena Witzke a Dissertation Completion Fellowship for the academic year of 2013-2014.
With such aid, Patrick, Erika, and Serena will be able to devote themselves to their dissertations full time during their fellowships. We applaud them for receiving such academic recognition, and invite you to read more about their work here.
UNDERGRADUATES RECEIVE ACADEMIC HONORS
Junior Phillip Alexander (Alex) Caprara was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa this term. The philosophy and Classics double-major is currently organizing the undergraduate conference for Eta Sigma Phi, the Classics undergraduate honors society.
Also, senior Steve Burges will share the results of his thesis, “The Birth of Roman Forum: Three-Dimensional Mapping and Rome’s Most Important Valley,” 1-3:45 p.m. Mon., April 15 at the Frank Porter Graham Student Union as part of the Fourteenth Annual Celebration of Undergraduate Research. There, he will discuss his revisionist digital terrain models of early Rome, created using geographical information systems (GIS) technology and under the supervision of Richard Talbert.
We congratulate Alex and Steve for their great accomplishments!
HANSEN, WORSHAM WIN FELLOWSHIPS TO STUDY AT ASCSA
Hans Hansen and Rebecca Worsham each recently won fellowships to attend The American School of Classical Studies at Athens as regular members next year.
Hansen, philology, won the James Rignall Wheeler Fellowship and Worsham, classical archaeology, the Emily Townsend Vermeule Fellowship to fund their studies. The program involves extensive travel and study of Greece with a diverse group of Classical scholars. Read more
UNDERGRADUATES WIN EPPS PRIZE AND HERINGTON SCHOLARSHIP
We are pleased to announce that Rachel Mazzara has won the Epps Prize in Greek Studies and Nicky Curtis the Herington Scholarship this spring 2013 semester.
"I feel very honored to have been chosen for the Epps Prize, and I'm grateful to all of the professors and classmates who have taught and encouraged me while I've been at UNC," Mazzara said in an emailed reaction to her award.
The faculty award Epps Prize to one junior or senior undergraduate or graduate student of Greek who shows "the greatest interest and promise in coming to understand the Greek language, literature, history, and outlook." It is named for Preston Epps, who taught in the department for many years.
Faculty grant the Hernington Scholarship of $450 to one first-year, sophomore, or junior Classics major or minor to further his or her studies at UNC or abroad. Preference is given to promising Greek students.
UNDERGRADUATE HENRY ROSS NAMED LUCE SCHOLAR
Henry Ross, a senior Classics major with a minor in biology and a Morehead-Cain Scholar, has been awarded a competitive fellowship from the Henry Luce Foundation to live and learn in Asia for a year after he graduates this spring. Read More
S. JAMES AWARDED FRIDAY AWARD FOR EXCELLENCE IN TEACHING
In the spring of 2013, Sharon L. James garnered the University's William C. Friday and Class of 1986 Award for Excellence in Teaching. The University gives only one Friday award annually to a faculty member who exemplifies excellence in teaching. It is named in honor of the University's late chancellor.
The University recognized Prof. James and other honored instructors during halftime at the UNC-Virginia Tech Feb. 2 men's basketball game.
"William C. Friday was one of the great leaders of higher education in U.S. history," Prof. James said. "To say that I was surprised to receive a teaching award established in his name would be a major understatement! I had no idea that I had been nominated. I'm extremely honored, and I would like to thank the colleagues and especially the students who supported my nomination."
The award comes at the end of a very busy 12 months for Prof. James, who co-directed the National Endowment for the Humanities Summer 2012 Institute: Roman Comedy in Performance and received news that Choice selected her co-edited volume, A Companion to women in the ancient world, as one of its "Outstanding Academic Titles of 2012." The Association of American Publishers also gave the volume honorable mention in its 2012 PROSE Awards. Established by members of UNC's 1986 graduating class, the award includes a stipend of $5,000.
We congratulate Prof. James on her well-deserved honor!
DEPARTMENT REMEMBERS GERHARD KOEPPEL
We are deeply saddened by the passing of Gerhard Koeppel, professor emeritus. During his decades in the department, Dr. Koeppel’s kindness left an indelible mark on Classical archaeology and his students and colleagues.
“Gerhard was a lovely, gentle man,” Sara Mack, professor emerita remembers. He was “a good teacher with a good sense of humor.” Read More
CLASSICS MAJOR INDUCTED INTO PHI BETA KAPPA
We would like to congratulate Matthew Cooper and Rebekah Rust for their initiation into Alpha of the North Carolina Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa.
Matthew and Rebekah join their fellow majors, Caitlin Hines, Rachel Mazzara, and Henry Ross, who were inducted last spring.
HERINGTON PRIZES AWARDED
We congratulate the winners of our annual Herington Prize in Latin and Greek poetry performance for the fall 2012. Undergraduates Heather Swanson and Caitlin Hines respectively impressed the departmental judges with their Latin and Greek readings, and Zack Rider bested his fellow graduate students with a Greek passage of his own choosing.
The Herington Prize was established in 1999 by Maynard and Florence Mack in honor of John Herington. Two undergraduates who perform the best reading of preselected Latin and Greek poems are awarded $200 each. The graduate winner receives a rare book donated by Sara Mack, professor emerita.
CHOICE CHOOSES S. JAMES'S COMPANION
The library journal Choice has selected Sharon L. James and Sheila Dillon's A Companion to Women in the Ancient World as an one of its Outstanding Academic Titles of 2012 in Ancient History.
"Choice grants this award to fewer than three percent of the books that are sent to it for review," Prof. James explained. "My co-editor, Sheila Dillon, and I -- along with our thirty-nine contributors -- are very pleased that our Companion is one of them."
Additionally, the Association of American Publishers gave the volume honorable mention in its 2012 PROSE Awards under the category of "Single Volume Reference in Humanities and Social Sciences."
Prof. James partnered with Prof. Dillon, associate professor of art history at Duke University, to co-edit the volume for Wiley-Blackwell.
ULLMAN'S LEGACY LIVES ON AT CATULLUS ONLINE
Much of Berthold L. Ullman's material on the manuscript tradition of Catullus is now openly available via Dr. Dániel Kiss's new website, Catullus Online.
Dr. Ullman (professor of Latin 1944-1959), one of the leading scholars of Latin paleography and manuscript traditions of his generation, bequeathed to the department his invaluable collection of facsimiles, transcriptions and notes. Prominent among them are material on the manuscript tradition of Catullus, which incorporated the earlier notes of William Gardner Hale and Euan T. Sage and which were the basis of a projected edition that Ullman did not live to complete.
Dr. Kiss, a research fellow at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, developed the website as a repository of conjectures on Catullus, compiling material from prominent libraries throughout the world. Dr. Kiss made several trips to the department over the years to consult the Hale-Ullman Papers, part of the department’s special collections in Ullman Library.
HINES FEATURED IN CAMWS NEWSLETTER FOR SCHOLARSHIP
Senior Caitlin Hines was featured in the newsletter for The Classical Association of the Middle West and South. Hines was spotlighted for winning the Manson A. Stewart Scholarship last spring.
"The Manson A. Stewart scholarship has been a great resource for funding my senior honors thesis, a gendered approach to the lexicon of Ovidian elegy with reference to the vocabulary of Propertius and Tibullus," Hines remarked. She is completing this project under the mentorship of Sharon L. James.
Visit the CAMWS website to read more about Hines's research.
S. JAMES'S NEH SUMMER INSTITUTE: ROMAN COMEDY NOW ONLINE
Clever slaves, braggart soldiers and cooks, enticing courtesans, and shouting fathers from ancient times are now on YouTube. The product of Sharon James's National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Institute: Roman Comedy in Performance, these experimental videos will serve as teaching and learning tools for those studying the often troubling but funny genre.
Co-directed by alumnus Timothy Moore, the institute was a collaborative project involving 23 professors and three graduate students and visiting faculty members. Participants created multiple performance versions of scenes from Plautus and Terence by experimenting with staging, actors, translation, choreography, and more. By doing so, they crafted an excellent series of scenes that relates the ancient plays to our modern society.
Click here to use the performances for your own teaching, research, and learning.
NEH PRIZES HAGGIS'S AZORIA PROJECT
Donald Haggis was recently awarded a three-year Collaborative Research Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, entitled "The Azoria Project Excavations: A Study of Urbanization on Crete, 700-500 B.C."
The award of $250,000 constitutes a significant contribution to on-going excavations at Azoria, which are scheduled to reopen in 2013 for a second five-year campaign, co-sponsored by The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. The Azoria Project is the excavation of an early Greek city (seventh to sixth centuries B.C.) on the island of Crete in the Aegean, studying urbanization and the changing sociopolitical and economic organization of an emergent urban community in the transition from the Early Iron Age (1200-700 B.C.) to Archaic periods (700-600 B.C.).
Earlier this year, The Archaeological Institute of America recognized Prof. Haggis and the Azoria Project with its "Best Practices in Site Preservation Award." Click here to learn about the Azoria Project.
BARAGAWANATH WINS VON HUMBOLDT FELLOWSHIP
Emily Baragwanath has captured an Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship that will enable her to research at Germany's University of Heidelberg for over a year.
"I am very excited and honored to have received a Humboldt Fellowship," Prof. Baragwanath said. "It provides me with a tremendous opportunity not only to pursue my own research, but also to engage with scholars in my field at a university that is one of the oldest and most esteemed in Europe."
From January 2013 to June 2014, Prof. Baragwanath will work on her monograph, provisionally titled Women, Narrative, and Agency in Xenophon. She will examine Xenophon's representation of women, how it relates to larger issues of friendship and leadership, and what it reveals about his approach to history, narrative, explanation, and literary invention.
OUTSTANDING UNDERGRADUATES
Murphey Hall continues to be home for a number of accomplished undergraduates.
Rachel Mazzara has published a translation of Catullus poem 51 in the Denison University undergraduate Classics journal, Ephemeris. Rachel's project was born as writing assignment in Ted Gellar-Goad's spring Latin 204 course.
"She's extremely bright and will make this department proud as she pursues a career in Classics," said Prof. Gellar-Goad, who is now serving as a post-doctoral fellow at Wake Forest University after finishing his Ph.D. here.
Rachel, however, is not the only promising young talent in the department. She, Caitlin Hines, and Henry Ross were all inducted into the University's Phi Beta Kappa chapter last spring. Further, the Classical Association of the Middle West and South honored Caitlin with a Manson A. Stewart Scholarship. One of six undergraduates recognized for being "outstanding young Classicists," Caitlin will use the $1,000 award to further her studies in the department.
We congratulate these promising juniors for their great accomplishments!
MAJOR ESPOUSES HER PASSION FOR CLASSICS IN USA TODAY
Junior Meghan DeMaria used her national platform as a USA Today collegiate correspondent to promote the advantages of majoring in Classics at Chapel Hill. Find out why Meghan thinks her major gives her a competitive edge here.
AIA's BEST SITE
Donald Haggis garnered the Archaeological Institute of America's Best Practices in Site Preservation Award for the Azoria Project in Crete, Greece.
Co-director Margaret Mook and Prof. Haggis work with local specialists to preserve the site as they excavate, creating a sustainable eco-archaeological tourist site. We applaud their innovative work, and invite you to learn more about and to support the Azoria Project. Read more
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Events
Lectures
The department regularly offers lectures from both resident faculty and visiting scholars. Click here for a list of upcoming lectures; please check back regularly for updates.
Brown Bag Talks
The department offers a series of semi-weekly, lunchtime talks given by graduate students and faculty on their current research. These Brown Bag Talks offer an opportunity to catch up on what other people in the department are working on, to present preliminary papers before conference talks and get feedback, and to learn something new about research interests outside your own field. Click here to see upcoming talks.
Departmental Tea
The department traditionally gathers for tea and light snacks in the late afternoon once a week. Tea is organized by the Tea Tsar or Tsarina, a graduate student duly elected each year by the graduate and post-baccalaureate students, and graduate students volunteer to bring food. Tea begins at 1:45 p.m. every Wednesday in Murphey 217.
Graduate Colloquium
The graduate students of the Department of Classics at UNC-Chapel Hill and Duke University jointly organize a graduate colloquium each year. Click here for more information on the current and previous colloquiums.
Tabulae
Tabulae, the department's annual newsletter, describes the activities and current research of members of the department, including undergraduate, post-baccalaureate, and graduate students, as well as faculty and alumni. Each issue also provides updates on all the changes that have occurred within the department in the preceding year, from budget updates to retirements and new hires. Click here to read for the most recent issue.