Pasts Imperfect (9.21.23)
Exhibiting Africa, Modernizing Homer, Peruvian Remains in American Museums, the Boyfriends Who Dream of the Roman Empire & More
This week, Solange Ashby addresses how museums collect and then exhibit material culture from Africa and the diaspora. Then, questions over the Smithsonian Museums’ holdings of Peruvian remains and the need for repatriation, a new profile of Homer translator Emily Wilson, the ancient jeans from 1200 BCE discovered in China, how Greek tragedy can help us with grief, why boyfriends on TikTok supposedly keep dreaming of the Roman Empire, and much more.
Exhibiting Africa by Solange Ashby
October 19-20, 2023, Bard Graduate Center & Brooklyn Museum
Growing up as a devoted museumgoer of African descent, I remember being dismayed—to put it nicely—at the inclusion of African art and archaeological artifacts in Natural History museums (Chicago’s Field Museum among many others). Why was African art and cultural heritage displayed as part of the “natural world” as opposed to being included in exhibits that displayed art, artifacts from ancient civilizations, or celebrations of human cultural heritage?
“Exhibiting Africa: State of the Field in African Art and the Diaspora,” a symposium organized jointly by the Bard Graduate Center and the Brooklyn Museum, brings that question to the fore.. Attendees will explore exhibition histories, collecting and exhibiting practices, and the diversity of global African populations. Annissa Malvoisin, Bard Graduate Center/Brooklyn Museum Postdoctoral Fellow in the Arts of Africa, and Drew Thompson, Associate Professor at Bard Graduate Center collaborated to bring this symposium to the public. The symposium will coincide with two exhibitions: SIGHTLINES on Peace, Power and Prestige: Metal Arts in Africa at Bard Graduate Center (September 29–December 31, 2023) and Sakimatwemtwe: A Century of Reflection on the Arts of Africa at the Brooklyn Museum (April 7, 2023–2025).
The symposium will be held over two days at two locations in New York City. We begin on Thursday, October 19th (1:30-5:15p.m.) at the Bard Graduate Center with two panels featuring scholars of African art. On Friday, October 20th (1:30-5:15 p.m.) two panels at the Brooklyn Museum will continue the conversation. These conversations among specialists of diverse disciplines have the potential to highlight commonalities among African ritual artifacts and various art forms as well as to demonstrate the unique elements of the multiplicity of cultures to be found in Africa. Additionally, this event marks two important milestones of exhibiting African art at the Brooklyn Museum. The current exhibition “Sakimatwemtwe” takes a retrospective view of the Arts of Africa over the course of a century, while our gathering occurs nearly 45 years after the landmark Brooklyn Museum exhibition “Africa in Antiquity: The Arts of Ancient Nubia and the Sudan.”
I am participating on Panel 1 at the Brooklyn Museum along with Dr. Andrea Myers Achi, the Mary and Michael Jaharis Associate Curator of Byzantine Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Our panel is moderated by Geoff Emberling, Nubian archaeologist and research assistant at the Kelsey Museum at the University of Michigan. As an Egyptologist and Nubian Studies professor at UCLA, I will speak about the practice of collecting Nubian artifacts, which were obtained in the early period of Egyptian archaeology chiefly by George Andrew Reisner of Harvard University and Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts. These excavations took place when Egypt and Sudan were still under British colonial rule, which allowed artifacts to be taken out of the country under a practice called “partage,” which was administered by colonial authorities. Several US institutions hold a wealth of Nubian artifacts. Unfortunately, many of those treasures languish in museum basements, thus the title of my presentation: “Hidden Treasures.” I will make a plea for museums to display their Nubian objects and bring Nubian history and culture to the attention of the larger museum-going public.
The underrepresentation of Nubian art in US museum exhibitions is also true for the larger field of African art. Sacred artifacts that comprise priceless cultural heritage are hidden away in museum basements, separated from their ritual context and denied treatment as legitimate objects of art. I hope that our discussions among renowned scholars of African art will generate a deeper appreciation of African art and clearer understanding of the collecting practices of museums and private individuals. We will ask hard questions about the ways in which these objects are displayed and studied, often by people outside of the culture that produced the objects. Wewill also suggest best practices going forward about how we (as scholars and museum patrons) might better engage with the cultural patrimony of the incredibly diverse, astoundingly ancient, and yet still living, cultures of the home of humanity: Africa.
Public Scholarship and a Global Antiquity
Speaking of museums, in an op-ed at The Washington Post, historian Christopher Heaney discusses the Peruvian human remains within the Smithsonian’s holdings, issues of repatriation, and how we might implement a more diverse view of anthropology as a field. The debate over provenance and the stakes museums hold continues at the New York Times: Graham Bowley reports that the Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg fired a curator over questions of potential looting. And at the Worcester Art Museum, an ancient Roman bust was seized by the Manhattan District Attorney. Finally, art historian Liz Marlowe—often leading the charge to determine provenance—discusses the seizure of a bronze Roman statue at the Cleveland Museum of Art. These and many other current stories indicate that museums are not (and never were) neutral. Issues of provenance and repatriation are important and not going away anytime soon.
Tulane archaeologists are using Lidar (light detection and ranging) technology to see exactly how rich a Maya city was. Archaeologist Francisco Estrada-Belli led the study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, which uses Classic Maya (250-900 CE) masonry to assess wealth and status. As they argue, “results demonstrate that Maya elites consistently located themselves at regular intervals among the general population in urban and rural areas alike to optimally oversee the use and exchange of resources.”
In the New York Times, Teju Cole addresses how Greek tragedy can help us deal with grief. Cole flew to Athens last summer and bought tickets to see works by Sophocles and Aeschylus in their ancient theatrical context.
Tragedy finds us where reasons end. When we witness this comfortless spiral onstage, we are in a sudden flood of light — not the benevolent light that guides our path or aids our vision, but the light of a conflagration, a phantasmagoric illumination that says: However bad you think it is, it can be worse, and it will be worse.
Ever wonder what a cowboy would wear 3,000 years ago? In the Turim Basin in China, archaeologists analyze the world’s oldest pair of jeans.
The New Yorker’s Judith Thurman interviews the world’s best translator of Homer, Emily Wilson. Read it for the Iliad hype; stay for the monkey anecdote. Also in The New Yorker, Nick Romeo reports on “The Hidden Archeologists of Athens” and how the Diplyon Society’s effort to catalog and map the data from rescue-excavations has uncovered the work of unrecognized archaeologists.
Congratulations to the Hopewell ceremonial earthworks in Ohio (US), which were finally recognized by UNESCO this week as a world heritage site. The earthworks are 1600-2000 years old and built by ancient native peoples. As the AP notes, “Preservationists, led by the Ohio History Connection, and indigenous tribes, many with ancestral ties to the state, pushed to recognize the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks for their good condition, distinct style and cultural significance — describing them as ‘masterpieces of human genius.’”
Does your boyfriend want to be the next Lucius Cornelius Sulla? Did you get him to admit it on camera? Sarah E. Bond and Stephanie Wong confronted the ancient history bros—you know the type—in this op-ed for MSNBC.
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New Antiquity Journal Issues (by @YaleClassicsLib)
Hermes Vol. 151, no. 3 (2023)
Historia Vol. 72, No. 4 (2023)
Romanitas - Revista de Estudos Grecolatinos Vol. 21 (2023) #openaccess
Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie Vol. 105, No. 3 (2023)
Bulletin de correspondance hellénique Vol. 145, No. 1 (2021) #openaccess NB Arthur Muller “L’« Aphrodite au livre » revisitée”
Journal of Ancient Judaism Vol. 14, No. 3 (2023)
Le Muséon Vol. 136, nos. 1-2 (2023)
Arethusa Vol. 56, No. 2 (2023)
Journal of Late Antiquity Vol. 6, No. 2 (2023)
Classics@ Vol. 23 (2023) #openaccess The Athenian Empire Anew: Acting Hegemonically, Reacting Locally in the Athenian Arkhē
Cahiers du Centre d’Études Chypriotes, Vols. 52-53 (2023) #openaccess Acts of the 27th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists (EAA): Cypriot section
Interférences Vol. 21 (2021) #openaccess Cicéron dans les écoles au début du principat : mémoire, littérature et rhétorique
Journal of Late Antique, Islamic and Byzantine Studies Vol. 2, Nos. 1-2 (2023)
Pallas Vol. 118 ( 2022) #openaccess Objets et lieux sacrés : réalités et imaginaires
American Journal of Archaeology Vol. 127, No. 4 (2023)
Journal of Semitic Studies Vol. 68, No. 2 (2023)
International Journal of Divination and Prognostication Vol. 4, No. 2 (2023)
ACOR Jordan Newsletter Vol. 35, No. 1 (2023) #openaccess
Journal of Classics Teaching Vo. 24, No, 48 (2023) #openaccess
Online Lectures, CFPs, and Current Museum Exhibitions
The new special exhibition, “Back to School in Babylonia,” opens today at the ISAC Museum in Chicago. This special exhibition is curated by Susanne Paulus, with Marta Díaz Herrera, Jane Gordon, Danielle Levy, Madeline Ouimet, Colton G. Siegmund, and Ryan D. Winters and with support from Pallas Eible Hargro, C Mikhail, Carter Rote, and Sarah M. Ware.
The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture is hosting a lecture on Thursday, September 28, 2023 at 12:00 PM EDT on Zoom: “Byzantium as an Indian Ocean Society,” given by Rebecca Darley, University of Leeds. As they note, “Much of the current move towards global history is focussed on connections. Viewed from this perspective, there is no very good reason for seeing Byzantium in the first millennium CE as an Indian Ocean society. Its direct contact with the Indian Ocean was attenuated in comparison with earlier Roman contact and increasingly mediated by others, most notably from the seventh century onwards, citizens of the Umayyad then Abbasid Caliphates.” Advance registration required.
The next online First Friday Workshop of North American Society for the Study of Christian Apocryphal Literature (NASSCAL) will, in fact occur, on the fifth Friday of September (the 29th, 12:00PM EST). Jeremiah Coogan, Ian Nelson Mills, Brent Nongbri, and Melissa Harl Sellew will discuss the recently published P.Oxy. 5575, containing sayings of Jesus, and dated to the 2nd Century C.E. Email nasscalworkshop@gmail.com for the link. For a preliminary overview of the papyrus and its importance, see Candida Moss “Scholars Publish New Papyrus With Early Sayings of Jesus.”
At the Newberry Library, the exhibition “Seeing Race Before Race” (Sept. 8th through December 30, 2023) examines expressions of race in Medieval and Early Modern Europe. It draws on the pioneering work of the RaceB4Race Research Collective. Co-Curator, Christopher Fletcher will discuss his work on the exhibit and the relevance of Critical Race Theory to medieval studies at the next installment of the Medieval Studies Lecture Series at Loyola University-Chicago and on Zoom Monday, Sept. 25th 4pm to 5pm CDT.
On October 3, 2023 at 5:00-6:00 pm BST, the Manchester Classical Association and the Manchester Centre for Youth Studies present: “Of Myths and Monsters”: Marchella Ward (Open University, and children's author) in conversation with April Pudsey. As they note, “Chella discusses her writing, the ancient myths, and shares snippets from her new book Beasts of the Ancient World, with Dr. April Pudsey, Classicist at Manchester Metropolitan University and Deputy Director of the Manchester Centre for Youth Studies.”