This volume examines the use of a central concept in the self-definition of any Greek speaking male: Andreia, the notion of courage and manliness. The nature and use of value terms quickly leads the researcher to core issues of cultural identity: through a combination of lexical or semantic and conceptual studies the discourse of manliness and its role in the construction of social order is studied, in a variety of authors, genres, and communicative situations. This book is of interest to students of the classical world, the history of values, gender studies, and cultural historians.
This collection of essays, the result of a 2006 conference at the University of Wales in Lampeter, look at the influence of philosophical texts on the ancient novel. In both Greek and Latin novels substantial traces of philosophical ideas can be found; these essays discuss the levels on which they were intended to operate, and how they were meant to resonate with their audiences. Specific authors discussed include Xenophon of Ephesus, Achilles Tatius, Longus, Apuleius and Lucian, while the philosophical influences include Plato, Aristotle and the Stoics.
On a world torn by war, two women discover a love that defies boundaries, challenges allegiances, and that just might mean the survival—or destruction—of all they hold dear. Roshan O’Landha, a Gantharian resistance fighter, works hard to maintain her cover as a wealthy businesswoman as war on occupied Gantharat seems imminent. When the Onotharian forces strike an overwhelming blow to the resistance, Roshan sends a plea for help to Kellen O’Dal, Protector of the Realm. In the meantime, Roshan is forced to work closely with Andreia M’Aldovar, a woman she once cared for who now holds a pivotal position in the Onotharian interim government. Andreia also guards a secret, one that if known could cost her life at the hands of either the Onotharians or the resistance. As the two women struggle to prevent annihilation, Roshan is given the only order she may not be able to obey, not even to save Gantharat—assassinate Andreia M’Aldovar.
Scholars have long been divided over whether the Amazons of Greek legend actually existed. Postcolonial Amazons offers a groundbreaking re-evaluation of the place of martial women in antiquity, bridging the gap between myth and reality by expanding our conception of the Amazon archetype to include the real female warriors of the ancient world.
This book offers the first systematic reading of Plato’s Laches in English after three decades of scholarly silence. It rekindles interest in this much-neglected dialogue by providing a fresh discussion of the major issues that arise from the text. Among these issues, pride of place is taken by the virtue of courage, for the definition of which Socrates is depicted as engaging in some long-winded dialectical exchange with his interlocutors. Yet, although there is no room for doubt that the Laches is Plato’s most explicit treatment of courage, this dialogue ends in perplexity and is thus traditionally thought of as an unsuccessful attempt to define what courage is. The present study challenges this suggestion. This book proposes a new paradigm for the interpretation of Plato’s Laches. In fact, it constitutes the first systematic attempt to study the dialogue in light of the idea that its composition could well have formed part of Plato’s overall plan to establish a well-defined and rigorous justification of the life of philosophical inquiry The book will be of key interest to classicists, philosophers, and intellectual historians, but will also appeal to students or anyone interested in ancient Greek philosophy.
Despite the growth of research on masculinity in both Gender and Classical Studies, and the resurgence of interest in ancient fiction, no volume has yet been devoted to exploring the representation of masculinity in ancient Greek novels. This ground-breaking study examines and contextualizes three key discourses of ancient Greek masculinity - paideia, andreia, and sexual ideology - as evidenced in the five 'ideal' Greek novels (namely those of Chariton, Xenophon of Ephesus, Achilles Tatius, Longus, and Heliodorus). Jones argues that while some of the narratives may be set in the classical past, the masculine concerns they display are inescapably symptomatic of the imperial present, reflecting some of the 'gender troubles' of the real world of their authors. Using modern theories of the 'performance' of gender as tools for analysis, the study finds that many of the novels' men betray an awareness that their masculine identities depend on the maintenance of their image before others - they are conscious of 'playing the man'. The book also puts forward the hypothesis that, while most of the authors uphold accepted scripts of masculinity, Achilles Tatius constructs Cleitophon as a 'misperformer' of masculinity as a means of challenging and subverting traditional codes of gender.
Conversa Brasileira, http://coerll.utexas.edu/brazilpod/cob/, is a web-based Portuguese program developed at the University of Texas, which is designed to provide intermediate- and advanced-level students of Portuguese with an opportunity to analyze and study how Brazilians actually talk to one another in informal conversations. The online materials are comprised of 35 short video clips that are accompanied with optional Portuguese subtitles, English translations, pop-up commentary and analysis, PDF lesson notes, and user discussion blogs. The content of the videos provides learners with a slice-of-live view of Brazilian conversations in natural settings. This textbook provides learners with a hard copy of the lesson transcripts, translations, and lesson notes. Conversa Brasileira is just one of the many Portuguese Language projects that make up the complete collection of BrazilPod, http://coerll.utexas.edu/brazilpod/index.php.
While Plato’s and Aristotle’s theories of virtue have received extensive scholarly attention, less work has been done on Xenophon’s portraits of virtue and on his attitude towards the theoretical issues connected with it. And yet, Xenophon offers one of the best sources we have for thinking about virtue in ancient Greece, because he combines the analytical interests of a Socratic with a historian’s interest in real life. Until recently, scholars of Xenophon tended to focus either on the historiographical writings or on the philosophical writings (chiefly Memorabilia, with some attention to the other Socratic writings and Hiero). Cyropaedia was treated as a separate entity, and Xenophon’s short and more technical treatises were generally studied only by those with particular interest in their specialized topics (such as horsemanship, hunting, and Athenian finances). But recent work by Vincent Azoulay and by Vivienne Gray have shown the essential unity of his writings. This volume continues this pan-Xenophontic trend by studying the virtues across Xenophon’s oeuvre and connecting them with a wide range of Greek literature, from Homer and the tragedians to Herodotus and Thucydides, the orators, Plato, and Aristotle.
