Penn-Leiden Colloquia on Ancient Values III

CFP: CITY AND COUNTRYSIDE IN THE ANCIENT IMAGINATION

First Announcement and Call for Papers
The Penn-Leiden Colloquia on Ancient Values was established as a biennial venue in which scholars can investigate the diverse aspects of Greek and Roman values. Each colloquium focuses on a single theme, which participants will explore from a diversity of perspectives and disciplines. A collection of papers from the first colloquium, held at Leiden in 2000, was published in 2003 under the title 'Andreia'- Manliness and Courage in Classical Antiquity, edd. Ralph M. Rosen and Ineke Sluiter. The second volume, Free Speech in Classical Antiquity, is scheduled to appear in 2005.

The topic of the third colloquium, to be held at the University of Leiden, the Netherlands, June 4-5, 2004, will be:

CITY AND COUNTRYSIDE IN THE ANCIENT IMAGINATION

The ancient (like the modern) imagination often envisages city and countryside as the sites of polar values: the city is routinely seen as the symbolic center of decadence and depravity, when opposed to the authenticity and purity of the countryside. On the other hand, in a similarly polarized construction, the city may represent the locus of sophistication and civilization, in contrast to the "rusticity" and lack of refinement associated with the countryside. Such polarities may find expression, or are allegedly detected, in linguistic usage and rhetorical strategies, or in debates that pit culture against nature, or primitivism against progressivism.

For this third colloquium, therefore, we invite abstracts for papers (30 minutes) on all aspects of our proposed topic, especially those that address the perennial tensions between country and city as expressions of lived value-systems.

Selected papers will be considered for publication by Brill Publishers. Those interested in presenting a paper are requested to submit a 1-page abstract, by email (preferable) or regular mail, before November 21st, 2003.

Contact (please copy both with email correspondence):

Professor Ineke Sluiter
Classics Department
University of Leiden
Doelensteeg 16 # 1174
POB 9515
2300 RA Leiden
The Netherlands
Email: i.sluiter@let.leidenuniv.nl
Phone: +31 (71) 527 3311

Professor Ralph M. Rosen
Department of Classical Studies
University of Pennsylvania
202 Logan Hall
Philadelphia PA 19104-6304
USA
Email: rrosen@sas.upenn.edu
Phone: +1 (215) 898 7425

-- seen on the Classics list

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