Pasts Imperfect

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Pasts Imperfect (4.14.22)
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Pasts Imperfect (4.14.22)

Covid Two Years On, 3D scanning the Parthenon, and More

Sarah E. Bond
and
Nandini Pandey
Apr 14
3
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Ptolemaic era mosaic of Arsinoe II (previously identified as Berenice II) showing her with the prow of a warship on her head symbolizing the city of Alexandria, Thmuis, Alexandria, National Museum, Egypt (Image via Wikimedia)

This week, Nandini Pandey discusses COVID-19 and its impact on those teaching the ancient world, over two years after the start of the pandemic. Then, the British Museum refuses to allow a 3D scan, bioarchaeology at the ancient Nubian site of Tombos, what Hesiod and Joan Didion have in common, and more.


“Classics” Two Years Later: Nandini Pandey Gathers Updates (Nandini Pandey)

In April 2020, I gathered scholars’ predictions on “classics” after the pandemic. Needless to say, the exercise was premature. Many of us still struggle daily with COVID consequences like daycare closures and changing public health and travel restrictions. Other consequences are longer-term, less predictable, yet predictably unequal along racial, gender, and other lines.

In this week’s SCS blog, “Two Years Later: “Classics” after Coronavirus?” I asked for updates from original contributors and others who’ve emerged as leaders during the pandemic. How have the past two years shaped their lives and senses of possibility? Shelley Haley, Ky Merkley, Michael K. Okyere Asante, Ximing Lu, Mira Seo, the London Classicists of Colour, Joel Christensen, and Scott Lepisto weighed in. Their updates are alternately sobering, thought-provoking, and inspiring, but all in their way are calls to action.

Some contributors report continued discrimination in new digital forms or rising obstacles to mental health and mobility. Others developed new ways of connecting and supporting people marginalized within academia. Dreams of academic employment have evaporated, one international global antiquities program is shuttering, and one original contributor, high school Latin teacher Michelle Bayouth, is now battling the closure of her program at Madison West. For some, closed doors have opened windows. The pandemic has brought unexpected opportunities to recalibrate life, work, and purpose. But for others, the future remains uncertain. And it’s going take a village to keep it bright.

Read contributors’ updates here, add your own in the comments, and remember — the Women’s Classical Caucus, the Society for Classical Studies, and advocacy groups founded by blog contributors (among others) welcome your aid in helping vulnerable scholars through hardships that, two years on, show no sign of ending.

And just a reminder:

Twitter avatar for @hashtagorasJoseph A. Howley @hashtagoras
Something I want people without small kids to understand is that this is still the case: sometimes daycare has to close because of a possible exposure, because none of these kids can get vaccinated, and then the wheels come off the entire rest of your work life

April 8th 2022

45 Retweets282 Likes

Public Scholarship on the Web

In Hyperallergic, Cassie Packard reports that the British Museum has denied the Institute for Digital Archaeology (IDA) ‘s request for a digital scan of a metope from the Parthenon’s south façade. The IDA had hoped to make a 3D scan in the same manner they did for the Arch of Palmyra.

Although permission had been denied, a team from the IDA brought an iPad-sized scanner to the British Museum and began to make scans. The museum said in a statement at the time that it “was deeply concerned to hear suggestions that unauthorized scanning took place in our galleries,” declaring the move a “breach of our visitor regulations.”

We fully adhered to the museum visitor guidelines, which seem to have been drafted to accommodate 3D scans,” Michel said.

Note that the “Guerrilla photogrammetrist and shadow IT raconteur” Daniel Pett has an impressive number of 3D models from the British Museum up on Sketchfab already.

Screenshot of Daniel Pett’s 3D models on Sketchfab. Pett was previously Digital Humanities lead at the British Museum and is now head of Digital/IT content at The Fitzwilliam Museum.

At JSTOR Daily, the latest Pasts Present column is written by Richard H Armstrong. From Hesiod to Joan Didion, Armstrong explores the daily stories we tell ourselves in order to live. As the pandemic stretches on, how do we think and write about our works and days?

A bust of Hesiod, a photograph of Joan Didion, the cover of Didion's book The White Album, and the first page of Hesiod's Work and Days
Hesiod & Joan Didion (Image via Wikimedia/ Jonathan Aprea for JSTOR Daily).

In The Conversation, anthropologist and bioarchaeologist Michele R. Buzon discusses the archaeological site of Tombos in northern Sudan and her work examining the skeletal and dental remains of the ancient Nubian community there. Additionally, she discusses her work with the Tombos excavation team and the local community:

A recent lecture and discussion that my Sudanese colleague, Remah Abdelrahim Kabashi Ahmed, and I held for the women of Tombos showed us how curious they are about the past as well as the present. Remah, who is training in bioarchaeology, and I answered questions such as: What kind of medicine did people use then? How old was the baby at death? Why did people put a bed and jewelry in their tomb? They notice the use of beds in ancient burials that look similar to those carved in recent times. They ask if we as women find the work physically difficult.

For more on ancient Nubia, see the work of Africanists like Solange Ashby, who will be giving the ASOR 2022 plenary in Boston on November 16, 2022.

In the “Dissertation Spotlight” section of Ancient Jew Review, Marshall Cunningham discusses Judaean identity and diaspora.

Twitter avatar for @ancientjewAncient Jew Review @ancientjew
Today's dissertation spotlight, on Judaean identity and the problems of "diaspora," comes from Marshall Cunningham.
buff.ly/3JRudvj

April 13th 2022

12 Retweets29 Likes

On a side note as Passover approaches: Please do not throw a “Christian Seder.”

Conferences, Lectures, and Keynotes of Interest

From April 21-22, 2022, the “Crossing Frontiers: the Evidence of Roman Coin Hoards” conference kicks off online. This conference is organized by the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire project and has been generously funded by the Augustus Foundation. Sign up for what promises to be an important study of coin hoards both within the Roman Empire and in frontier zones.

Twitter avatar for @ChreProjectCHRE project @ChreProject
Only one week until our conference on Crossing Frontiers with speakers including @IreneSotoMarin @AHostein @FrankfurtWiggy @jk_viking @Gordien3a @GazdacCristian looking at hoarding across the ancient world 📢 21-22 April 2022 Registration
teams.microsoft.com/registration/G… Programme ⬇️⬇️⬇️
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April 13th 2022

8 Retweets14 Likes

On April 27, 2022 at MIT, Hannah Čulík-Baird is giving a talk on her new book, Cicero and the Early Latin Poets. You can register for the zoom lecture here.

Twitter avatar for @opietasanimiDr Hannah Čulík-Baird @opietasanimi
Pleased to announce that I will be speaking at MIT on April 27th as part of the AMS Colloquium Series. I'll be presenting material from my book — "Cicero and the Early Latin Poets" — which will have just come out! Register here for the zoom link:
mit.zoom.us/meeting/regist…
AMS Colloquium Series Presents,
Cicero and the Early Latin Poets

Speaker: Hannah Čulík-Baird
Assistant Professor, Department of Classical Studies at Boston University

When: Wednesday, April 27th @ 5:15pm (ET)
Where: Register for Zoom | Add to Calendar

Abstract: Cicero's writings contain hundreds of quotations of Latin verse from Latin poets of the 2nd century BCE, such as Ennius, Pacuvius, Accius, and Lucilius. In this lecture, Hannah Čulík-Baird explains the significance of Latin poetry to the late Republican orator, contextualizing Cicero's poetic quotations within contemporary intellectual practices at Rome.

Bio: Hannah Čulík-Baird is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Classical Studies at Boston University. Her book, Cicero and the Early Latin Poets, is forthcoming with Cambridge University Press (April 2022).

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Image: A manuscript of Cicero De Senectute (Arundel 124 f89r, British Library) with a gold box containing the location, title, and speaker’s information. Log

April 4th 2022

8 Retweets51 Likes

​

At Everyday Orientalism, there will be an online roundtable to discuss characterizations of “civilization” on Apr. 21, 2022 from 10-11:30am Toronto-time. Join guests Adam Benkato, Katherine Blouin, Suzanne Conklin Akbari, Suleyman Dost, and Heba Mostafa to discuss questions such as: What are the ancient roots of the notion of “civilization”? How does the reality of the period spanning from the so-called ‘Classical’ past to the early Islamic period disrupt this narrative? This event is co-sponsored by the University of Toronto’s Institute of Islamic Studies.

New Online Journal Issues @YaleClassicsLib
Colin is on paternity leave for the month of April. We celebrate and respect this. Congratulations and this section will return in May!

Pitches

The Public Books section "Antiquities" continues to take pitches for articles to be published in 2022. You can pitch to our “Pasts Imperfect” column at the LA Review of Books using this form and to the new JSTOR column here. Thanks for reading!

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