Mortality: Facing Death in Ancient Greece

An NEH Summer Institute in Athens, Greece
Director: Professor Karen Bassi, University of California at Santa Cruz

The University of California at Santa Cruz, in sponsorship with the Institute for Humanities Research, invites applications for a four-week Summer Institute funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) on the topic of Mortality: Facing Death in Ancient Greece. The Institute will be held in Athens, Greece from June 29 to July 27, 2014.

This Institute begins from the premise that mortality is the condition that gives life its singular human quality. Yet this fact, so often relegated to euphemism, has resisted anything like a comprehensive examination. The goal of this Institute is to develop a multi-disciplinary approach to mortality in ancient Greece as the basis for rigorous and innovative teaching and scholarship across the Humanities.

The NEH Institute will bring together twenty-two college and university teachers and three graduate students to examine relevant material from a broad range of ancient Greek literary sources, visual and archaeological remains, and historical periods, ranging from the 8th to the 3rd centuries BCE. In addition to attending lectures and seminars hosted by six outstanding visiting scholars, participants will present the results of their own research projects in a series of colloquia in the final week of the Institute.

NEH Summer Institutes for College and University Teachers provide college and university faculty members, independent scholars, and graduate students with an opportunity for intensive collaborative study of texts, topics, and ideas central to undergraduate teaching in the humanities under the guidance of faculties distinguished in their fields of scholarship. Institutes aim to prepare participants to return to their classrooms with a deeper knowledge of current scholarship in key fields of the humanities. Individuals selected to participate in this four-week Institute will receive $3,300. These taxable stipends are intended to help cover travel expenses to and from the project location, books and other research expenses, and living expenses for the duration of the period spent in residence.

Applicants must be United States citizens, residents of U.S. jurisdictions, or foreign nationals who have been residing in the United States or its territories for at least the three years immediately preceding the application deadline. Foreign nationals teaching abroad at non-U.S. chartered institutions are not eligible to apply.

For more information, including a full description of the research and pedagogical aims of the Institute, a complete list of the participating faculty, Institute location and housing information, a detailed day-to-day schedule, and how to apply, please visit the project’s website: mortality.ihr.ucsc.edu

Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

NEH_logo NEH_photo