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Call for Proposals: CAAS 2025 Annual Meeting

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The Classical Association of the Atlantic States 2025 Annual Meeting
Dates: October 9-11, 2025
Venue: The DoubleTree by Hilton Silver Spring, Silver Spring, MD

Deadline for all proposals: Friday, April 25, 2025 (11:59 p.m.)

The CAAS Annual Meeting is a dynamic two-day forum that brings together college professors and secondary education teachers from the region and beyond to connect with one another, showcase their innovative research, and present groundbreaking teaching strategies.  Registrants can attend scholarly papers, panels, workshops, and roundtables or browse vendor tables and exchange conversations with old and new colleagues during breakfasts and coffee breaks.  Our Friday evening reception provides additional networking opportunities and a relaxed atmosphere, allowing attendees to engage with our distinguished speaker before the talk and gain insights in a friendly setting.  Our meeting features two luncheons and a dinner, during which members with outstanding service to CAAS and the profession, as well as exceptional students, are honored.

Our keynote address is the Jerry Clack Memorial lecture delivered on Friday evening.  This year’s distinguished speaker is Dr. Paul Roberts, Research Keeper in the Department of Antiquities at the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, Oxford University, United Kingdom.  The title of his lecture is “Rome: Monarchs and Monuments.” Drawing on the remains of the monuments themselves, ancient accounts, recent archaeological excavations, and evocative reconstructions, the talk will cast light not only on how some of Rome’s most iconic structures were built but also why and how they were used, and abused, during and after the time of the Roman Empire.

We invite proposals for individual papers, panels, and workshops/roundtables on any aspect of the Greco-Roman world, including but not limited to poetry (from epic, lyric, and pastoral to elegy, satire, and the epigram), drama, history, philosophy, archaeology, religion, and social life (from family and gender roles to slavery and prostitution).  Especially welcome are submissions that explore the reception of classical antiquity in modernity and in spheres as diverse as prose, graphic novels, theater, painting, sculpture, dancing, photography, fashion, video games, and cinema.  We are also very eager to receive proposals that focus on pedagogy and explore cutting-edge teaching methods that integrate the interests of K-12 educators and college faculty.  Areas of particular interest include (but are not limited to) the Advanced Placement program (AP), Comprehensible Input (CI), teaching diverse and/or nontraditional learners, teaching Latin from later periods, assessments and Artificial Technology (AI), and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) tools for the classroom.  Additionally, we welcome submissions that share fresh ideas about communicating the importance of Classics beyond our discipline and profession; that explore connections between the Greco-Roman world and other ancient civilizations (such as Egypt, Carthage, Mesopotamia, China, Sub-Saharan Africa, and pre-Columbian America); and that reflect on the past, present, and future of Classical Studies in the CAAS region and beyond.

Click here to view/download CFP (PDF format)

SUBMISSION DETAILS

Submit here: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=caas2025

Eligibility to submit a proposal:  All submitters must be members of CAAS when they submit their proposal.  The CAAS membership year is January 1-December 31.  Membership dues can be paid at: https://caas.press.jhu.edu/membership/join.  Organizers of panels and workshops must verify participants’ membership status before submitting the proposal.  Undergraduate students making an individual submission must ensure their mentors have paid the CAAS membership fee for 2025 before making a submission.  

Single appearance policy:  Each submitter must not submit more than one abstract (whether single or co-authored).  Authors of individual paper proposals cannot simultaneously submit an abstract as part of a panel or workshop proposal.  Panel and workshop/roundtable organizers should ensure that participants in their proposed sessions do not intend to appear anywhere else on the program as speakers.   

Individual Paper Proposals must be drafted for a presentation of 15 minutes in length.  When the Program is finalized, additional time may be granted by the Program Coordinator depending on the number of papers included in each session.  Abstracts of circa (but no more than) 300 words must be uploaded as an Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) file (not as a Word Document) and:

  1. Include a clear thesis and state the paper’s original contribution(s) by situating it in a larger scholarly context.  The Program Committee expects to see this at the outset of the abstract.
  2. Be accompanied by a bibliography of five items (not included in the word limit).  The expectation of the Program Committee is that submitters weave these references into the narrative (using parenthetical citations) to build the argument, rather than just listing them at the end.  A couple of major/recent publications (depending on the topic of the presentation) should feature in the bibliography.  Pedagogy-related abstracts may include fewer references if they build upon teaching approaches in progress explored by the submitter(s) and/or other educators. 
  3. Be anonymous. The author’s name should not appear anywhere in the submission.  References to the author’s own publications or pedagogical techniques should be done in the third person.  Abstracts that include the names of authors and/or their institutional affiliations will be rejected automatically.   

If you are an undergraduate student, please first select “Individual” under Type of Submission and then “Undergraduate Paper.” 

Panel Proposals must be drafted for a session of either 2 hours in length (3 speakers) or 2 ½ hours (4 speakers).  A respondent may be included in the latter category as an additional speaker.  Especially welcome are proposals that seek to showcase the research of graduate and undergraduate students of a department in the CAAS region and beyond, and include at least one paper to be read by a faculty member who serves as an advisor.  Proposals must be submitted by the organizer(s) as a single Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) file (not as a Word Document) and include:  

  1. The title of the panel and titles of each individual presentation.
  2. An introductory paragraph that outlines the objective(s) of the panel as a whole and specifies its original contribution, situating the panel in a larger scholarly context.
  3. Abstracts of the individual presentations. The limit for the proposal as a whole is 1,000 words.
  4. A bibliography of five items (not included in the word limit) following each of the abstracts.  The expectation of the Program Committee is that authors weave these references into the narrative (using parenthetical citations) to build the argument, rather than just listing them at the end of their abstract.  A couple of major/recent publications (depending on the topic of the panel) should feature in the bibliography.  Pedagogy-related proposals may include fewer references if they build upon teaching approaches in progress explored by each speaker and/or other educators.  The topics suggested under workshops/roundtables below may also be pursued as a panel. 
  5. Beanonymous.  The names of those involved in the proposal — organizer(s), presenters, and respondents (if any) — must not appear anywhere in the submission except when citing their own publications or pedagogical methods, which must be done in the third person.  Abstracts including the names and/or institutional affiliations of the organizer(s), presenters, and respondent will be rejected automatically. 

If the proposal includes a speaker/respondent who charges a fee, the organizer(s) is/are responsible for covering the cost.  CAAS does not provide funding for such expenses.  

Workshops/Roundtables are typically allocated 2 hours – more time may be allocated by the Program Coordinator depending on the number of speakers – and are expected to be devoted, for their most part, to a discussion between the organizer(s)/presenter(s) and the audience.  Such sessions are ideal for pedagogy-related topics.  In addition to the topics listed above under Call for Proposals, we especially welcome submissions that:

  • challenge the traditional grammar-translation approach to teaching classical languages
  • revisit classical texts in pursuit of new material and ideas that address the interests of a diverse student body
  • demonstrate how identifying bias and discrimination in ancient sources can build stronger connections between past and present
  • examine how textbooks can restore the voices of underrepresented or suppressed groups (e.g., women, enslaved humans, people of color) in order to be more inclusive of the changing demographics in American society
  • explore how the incorporation of noncanonical authors or writings (e.g., graffiti, funerary inscriptions, etc.) can enrich the curriculum
  • illustrate how new technologies, such as AI, can transform the study of ancient texts and improve our appreciation of Greco-Roman culture.

The above list of topics is not meant to be exhaustive.  Workshop/roundtable proposals are limited to 700 words. Submissions must adhere to the guidelines for panel proposals. However, a bibliography of five items (not included in the word limit) should relate to the proposal as a whole rather than to each individual talk.  Fewer references may be included if the proposal builds upon pedagogical approaches in progress as explored by the speaker(s) and/or other educators.  If the proposal includes a speaker/respondent who charges a fee, the organizer(s) is/are responsible for covering the cost.  CAAS does not provide funding for such expenses.

Formatting and other guidelines for individual abstracts and panel proposals:

  • The abstract in the .pdf file that is to be uploaded to EasyChair must be double-spaced and typed in 12-point Times New Roman font.
  • Indent the first line of paragraphs after the first one and center the title(s).
  • Ensure that the submission is anonymous throughout. Participants in panels, workshops, and roundtables should be identified in the abstract as speaker/paper #1, #2, etc.

Submission of an abstract is a commitment to present the paper in person.  If a paper must be read in absentia due to extenuating circumstances, the author must inform both the presiders and the Program Coordinator, Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos, as soon as they can, and arrange for a reader to read the paper on their behalf.  The author must also register for the Annual Meeting in the respective category (faculty or student).  Mentors of undergraduate students are expected to attend in person.  If this is not possible due to extenuating circumstances, they still must register in order for their name to feature in the final draft of the Program.

All authors will be notified about the status of their submission by the end of May.  If the submission is accepted for presentation, all speakers and organizers must register online through Johns Hopkins University Press no later than 11:59 p.m. on Monday, September 8, 2025.  After that date, registration is available at the hotel only and at a higher cost.  Authors of individual papers are expected to send a draft of their presentation and a copy of their handout or PowerPoint to their presiders by Monday, September 29, 2025. 

CAAS is committed to providing a safe and welcoming environment for all participants in our meeting. All submitters are advised to read the CAAS Anti-Racism Committee statement on condemning the use of the texts, ideals, and images of the Greek and Roman world to promote hateful ideology.

Submit here: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=caas2025

For academic questions, please contact CAAS Program Coordinator Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos (knikolou@sju.edu).  Technical questions regarding submission through EasyChair should be addressed to CAAS Webmaster Jennifer Ranck (webmaster@caas-cw.org).

CAAS Conference Travel Subsidies:  CAAS offers need-based travel subsidies (up to $600) to speakers to attend the 2025 Annual Meeting.  The call for applications will be announced by the Chair of the Program Committee Travel Subsidies Subcommittee in early June, after the circulation of the first draft of the Program by the Program Coordinator.  

CAAS Presentation Awards:  In 2023, at the initiative of Program Coordinator Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos, CAAS introduced monetary rewards to recognize the excellence of papers delivered in person at the annual meeting in four different categories: Post-Ph.D. ($700); Graduate Student ($500); Undergraduate Student ($300); and K-12 Educator ($700).  Presiders appointed by the Program Coordinator who receive advance copies of papers to be read in their sessions nominate outstanding individual presentations after the annual meeting, submitting detailed commentary on oral delivery.  Members of the Awards Subcommittee and/or members of the Program Committee with expertise in the subject nominate outstanding presenters at organized panels refereed by the Program Committee.  The Chair of the Program Committee Awards Subcommittee appointed by the Program Coordinator will announce recipients of awards before December 31, 2025.  

The winners of the 2024 CAAS Annual Meeting are:

Post-Ph.D.: Sarah Brown Ferrario (The Catholic University of America)

Graduate Student: Olivia May (Princeton University)

Undergraduate Student: Maxwell Mitchell (Vassar College)

K-12 Educator: Andrew Hagerty (Townsend Harris High School and Graduate Center, City University of New York)

CUNY Graduate Center (NYC) Classics Department Open House 11/01/2024

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The Classics Department of the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC invites those interested in our PhD and MA programs to attend a hybrid (in-person AND Zoom) open house.

Date: Friday, 01 November
Time: 12pm EST

Come meet faculty and current students to learn about the educational and teaching opportunities available in the heart of New York City!  

Link to poster about the event: https://tinyurl.com/2m77588f

Our MA program is ideal for those who want to work on their languages before applying to PhD programs.

To register, please email Rachel Kousser at RKousser@gc.cuny.edu

For more information on our programs, please visit: https://www.gc.cuny.edu/classics
For more information on funding/financial aid: https://www.gc.cuny.edu/fellowships-and-financial-aid

The 2024 Fall Annual Meeting of The Classical Association of the Atlantic States

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When: Thursday, October 17 to Saturday, October 19, 2024

Where:  The Heldrich Hotel & Conference Center, New Brunswick, NJ

Program: Click here to view current draft of program (updated October 9, 2024)

Letter from CAAS President: Click here to view welcome letter from CAAS President Dan-el Padilla Peralta

Letter from CAAS Executive Director: [forthcoming]

Election/Ballot Form: [forthcoming]

Exhibitors and Vendors:  Please register via the registration form below and then email the Executive Director, Mary Brown (mbrown@sju.edu) to request a table/space in the exhibit hall.

Fall 2024 Meeting Registration Form (register online – options for meals deadline 9/25/2024): https://caas.press.jhu.edu/membership/conference

Reservations link and info for The Heldrich Hotel & Conference Center: 

  • Direct Booking Link: CAAS Annual Conference Room Block
  • Phone Booking: Reservations Line (866) 609-4700 
  • Cut-off Date to Book: 09/25/24
  • NOTA BENE: Guests may reference the group name: CAAS Annual Conference Room Block OR Group Code: 550201

CFP Emerging Scholars — NYU Center for Ancient Studies

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The NYU Center for Ancient Studies
welcomes proposals for the Emerging Scholars Series  

The Emerging Scholars video series pairs PhD students from U.S. and international institutions with NYU faculty members to discuss innovative approaches to the study of the ancient world and/or research that incorporates non-traditional materials and methods. We are also especially interested in highlighting the work of scholars from groups that are and have historically been marginalized and underrepresented in the fields of ancient studies and the academy at large.

The presentation format of the videos features individual PhD candidates who briefly describe their research and then engage in conversation with an NYU faculty member that positions this work in relation to broader scholarship. These videos will be advertised as part of the Center’s academic program and highlighted on our website. 

To these ends, we seek proposals from students working in the ancient world, broadly conceived. In order to submit a proposal, please send a short abstract (250 words or less) on your topic of research along with a current CV to ancient.studies@nyu.edu. We welcome new proposals on a rolling basis.

The CAAS Dr. Rudolph Masciantonio Grants Committee Mission and Charge 2024

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The CAAS Dr. Rudolph Masciantonio Grants Committee

The CAAS Dr. Rudolph Masciantonio Grants Committee: Henry Bender & Mary Brown (Co-Chairs, Formation Years 2021-2023; 2024-2026) Committee Members (Formation Years 2021-2023; 2024-2026): Martha Davis, Jeannette Keshishian, Stephen Ogumah, Donald Sprague, Karin Suzadail, William Torchia [adjunct/advisory member].

Click here to view/download the full Mission and Charge for this Committee (PDF format – Mission statement copied below)

CAAS MISSION STATEMENT

“The mission of The Classical Association of the Atlantic States (CAAS), founded in 1907, is to strengthen teaching and research, and to foster public support, for the languages, civilizations, and cultures of ancient Greece and Rome in the mid-Atlantic region (Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania). In furtherance of its mission, CAAS publishes a quarterly journal, Classical World.

“The Classical Association of the Atlantic States offers an Annual Fall Meeting in the region, usually during Columbus Day weekend. Besides papers and panels on many Classical topics, these meetings are notable for their sessions on new directions in teaching and research and for their discussions and workshops on professional issues such as the state of Classics in other countries, preparation of professional abstracts, etc. All members receive the association’s Journal, Classical World, which publishes articles and reviews for “the scholarly teacher and the teaching scholar.” Among the Journal’s unique features are regular surveys of textbooks and audio-visual materials in Classics. [CAAS-CW website as of March 1, 2023]”

CFP: CUNY Graduate Student Conference in Classics

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Weaving Words, Sculpting Sentiments: Manipulating Emotions in Public Spaces of the Ancient Mediterranean

The graduate students of the Department of Classics at the CUNY Graduate Center are pleased to announce the call for papers for our 16th annual Graduate Student Conference. The conference will be held in person and via Zoom on Friday, April 5th, 2024 at the Graduate Center (365 Fifth Ave, New York, NY). This year’s Keynote Speaker will be Prof. David Konstan (NYU).

Click here to view/download the CFP in PDF format or here for Word format

Emotions play a large role in even basic decision-making, as recent research continues to demonstrate.  Fear, sadness, pride, guilt, shame, awe, joy, and disgust all inform our decisions and influence our participation in social movements. Emotional responses can arise from our relationships with other people, impacted by their own decisions that affect us, but also from our relationship with institutions. For various reasons, these institutions often manipulate emotional responses across the entire public through rhetoric, iconography, space, religion, or architecture.

In this conference, we would like to explore the interplay in antiquity between the manipulation of emotions through public displays (written, spoken, material, or visual mediums) and the collective or individual responses to these manipulations.

  • What are the modes of emotional control imposed upon the public?
  • What degree of success did these methods of control see, or to what degree was resistance to emotional manipulation present?
  • Were there emotional responses that were more commonly evoked in people collectively, and in what contexts do these appear?

Possible topics include but are not at all limited to:

  • Speech as a form of emotional persuasion and/or manipulation in ancient epic
  • Appeals to renew empathy and religious duty in prophetic and other religious texts
  • Weaponization of shame and outrage in epideictic, deliberative, and forensic rhetoric
  • Collective processing of the trauma of war and plague in Greek theater
  • Public responses to iconography and architectural space in Roman Republican and Imperial Fora, including pride, fear, and awe
  • Fear and disgust in mythic depictions of monsters and the unknown
  • Rebuilding, reimagining, and continued use of public spaces into the modern era in efforts to manipulate or erase collective memory
  • Philosophical approaches to emotion and emotional manipulation in the civic realm
  • Any other literary, visual, or historical engagement with emotions in public space

We invite papers from a variety of disciplines beyond Classics, such as Comparative Literature, History, Philosophy, Art History, Political Science, Gender Studies, Psychology, Near Eastern studies, and others. We welcome and encourage submissions from individuals of all underrepresented backgrounds.

Please send anonymous abstracts of up to 300 words, along with an optional bibliography, for a 20-minute presentation to cunyclassicsconference@gmail.com in PDF format, no later than January 19, 2024. Please send personal details, such as full name and affiliation, in the body text of your email. Notifications to all applicants will be given by mid-February 2024. Questions may be sent to the co-organizers, Nan Coffey, Kevin Nobel, and Jen Ranck at the same email address.

We look forward to an engaging and diverse exploration of the topic.

Call for Proposals: CAAS 2024 Annual Meeting

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The Classical Association of the Atlantic States 2024 Annual Meeting
Dates: October 17-19, 2024
Venue: The Heldrich Hotel & Conference Center, New Brunswick, NJ

Deadline for all proposals: Friday, February 16, 2024 (11:59 p.m ET)

Click here to view/download CFP (PDF format)

We invite proposals for individual papers, panels, and workshops/roundtables on all aspects of the ancient world and its afterlife. Especially welcome are submissions that propose groundbreaking approaches to established scholarly debates on classical antiquity; that aim at maximum audience participation and integrate the interests of K-12 and college faculty; that explore new strategies and resources for improved and inclusive teaching; that share fresh ideas about communicating the importance of ancient Greece and Rome beyond our discipline and profession; that explore connections between the Greco-Roman world and other ancient civilizations; and that reflect on the past, present, and future of Classical Studies in the CAAS region and beyond.

SUBMISSION DETAILS

Eligibility to submit a proposal:  All submitters must be members of CAAS when they submit their proposal.  The CAAS membership year is January 1-December 31.  Organizers of panels and workshops must verify participants’ membership status before submitting the proposal.  Undergraduate students making an individual submission must ensure their mentors have paid the CAAS membership fee for 2024 before making a submission.  

Single appearance policy:  Each submitter must not submit more than one abstract (whether single- or co-authored).  Authors of individual paper proposals cannot simultaneously submit an abstract as part of a panel or workshop proposal.  Panel and workshop organizers should ensure that participants in their proposed sessions do not intend to appear anywhere else on the program as speakers.   

Individual Paper Proposals must be drafted for a presentation of 15 minutes in length.  When the Program is finalized, additional time may be granted depending on the number of papers included in each session.  Abstracts of circa (but no more than) 300 words must be uploaded as an Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) file and:

  1. Include a clear thesis and state the paper’s original contribution(s) by situating it in a larger scholarly context.  The Program Committee expects to see this at the outset of the abstract.
  2. Be accompanied by a bibliography of five items (not included in the word limit).  The expectation of the Program Committee is that submitters weave these references into the narrative (using parenthetical citations) to build the argument, rather than just listing them at the end.  A couple of major/recent publications (depending on the topic of the presentation) should feature in the bibliography.  Pedagogy abstracts may reference innovative teaching approaches in progress explored by the submitter(s) and/or other educators. 
  3. Be anonymous. The author’s name should not appear anywhere in the submission.  References to the author’s own publications or pedagogical techniques should be done in the third person.  Abstracts that include the names of authors and/or their institutional affiliations will be rejected automatically.   

If you are an undergraduate student, please first select “Individual” under Type of Submission and then “Undergraduate Paper.” 

Panel Proposals must be drafted for a session of either 2 hours in length (3 speakers) or 2 ½ hours (4 speakers).  A respondent may be included in the latter category as a fifth speaker.  Especially welcome are proposals that seek to showcase the research of (under)graduate students of a department in the CAAS region and beyond and include at least one paper to be read by a faculty member who serves as advisor.  Proposals must be submitted by the organizer(s) as a single Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) file and include:  

  1. The title of the panel and titles of each individual presentation.
  2. An introductory paragraph that establishes the coherence of the panel as a whole and indicates its original contribution, situating the panel in a larger scholarly context.
  3. Abstracts of the individual presentations. The limit for the proposal as a whole is 1,000 words.
  4. A bibliography of five items (not included in the word limit) following each of the abstracts.  The expectation of the Program Committee is that authors weave these references into the narrative (using parenthetical citations) to build the argument, rather than just listing them at the end of their abstract.  A couple of major/recent publications (depending on the topic of the panel) should feature in the bibliography.  Pedagogy proposals may reference innovative teaching approaches in progress explored by the submitter(s) and/or other educators. 
  5. Beanonymous.  The names of those involved in the proposal — organizer(s), presenters, and respondent (if any) — must not appear anywhere in the submission except when citing their own publications or pedagogical methods, which must be done in the third person.  Abstracts including the names and/or institutional affiliations of the organizer(s), presenters, and respondent will be rejected automatically. 

Workshops/roundtables are typically allocated 2 hours and expected to be devoted, for their most part, to a discussion between the organizer(s)/presenter(s) and the audience.  Presentations, if any, must, therefore, be shorter than those included in organized panels.  All the above guidelines for panels apply to workshop/roundtable proposals except that the limit for the submission as a whole is 700 words, excluding bibliographical references.

Submission of an abstract is a commitment to present the paper in person.  If a paper must be read in absentia due to extenuating circumstances, the author must inform both the presiders and the Program Coordinator, Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos, as soon as they can, and arrange for a reader to read the paper on their behalf.  The author must also register for the Annual Meeting in the respective category (faculty or student).  Mentors of undergraduate students are expected to attend in person.  If this is not possible due to extenuating circumstances, they still must register in order for their name to feature in the final draft of the Program.

All authors will be notified about the status of their submission by/in mid-May 2024.  If the submission is accepted for presentation, all speakers and organizers must register online through Johns Hopkins University Press by September 23, 2024.  After that date, registration is available at the hotel only and at a higher cost.  Authors of individual papers are expected to send a draft of their presentation and a copy of their handout or PowerPoint to their presiders by/on Monday, October 7, 2024. 

All submitters are advised to read the CAAS Anti-Racism Committee statement on condemning the use of the texts, ideals, and images of the Greek and Roman world to promote hateful ideology.

Submit here: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=caas2024

For academic questions, please contact CAAS Program Coordinator Konstantinos P. Nikoloutsos (knikolou@sju.edu).  Please contact Webmaster Jennifer Ranck (webmaster@caas-cw.org) with technical questions regarding submission through EasyChair.

CAAS Conference Travel Subsidies:  CAAS offers need-based travel subsidies (up to $600) to speakers and members planning to attend the Annual Meeting.  The call for applications will be announced by the Chair of the Program Committee Travel Subsidies Subcommittee in late Spring 2024, after the circulation of the first draft of the Program by the Program Coordinator.  

CAAS Presentation Awards:  In accordance with the Board’s decision at the April 2023 meeting, CAAS recognizes the excellence of papers delivered in person at the annual meeting by means of monetary awards in four categories: Post-Ph.D.; Graduate Student; Undergraduate Student; and K-12 Educator.  Presiders who will receive advance copies of papers to be read in their sessions will nominate outstanding individual presentations after the annual meeting, submitting detailed commentary on oral delivery.  Members of the Awards Subcommittee and/or members of the Program Committee with expertise in the subject will nominate outstanding presenters at organized panels refereed by the Program Committee.  The Chair of the Program Committee Awards Subcommittee will announce recipients of awards before December 31.

Penn Public Lectures on Classical Antiquity and the Contemporary World

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The Penn Department of Classical Studies announces the following lectures in the ongoing series of “Penn Public Lectures on Classical Antiquity and the Contemporary World”:

Elena Isayev (Univerity of Exeter) will be speaking on “People Out of Place: Mediating Sovereignty and Power, Past and Present”

  • November 2, 5:00 PM EDT: “Who is the Host? Asylum Requests, Sovereignty and Recognition in the Polis of Greek Tragedy and Among Nations Today”
  • November 7, 5:00 PM EST: “The Exile as Weapon:  Moving People to Challenge Autonomy and Exert Authority – Hellenistic Decrees and Televised Push-backs”
  • November 9, 5:00 PM EST : “Non-Return and Non-Arrival: Interdependence through Exclusion, Captivity and Incomplete Restitution”

Register for in-person or online attendance at https://www.classics.upenn.edu/events/penn-public-lectures

In Memoriam: Daniel P. Tompkins

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Submitted by Robin Mitchell-Boyask, Professor and Chair, Department of Greek and Roman Classics, Temple University

Daniel P. Tompkins passed away on Saturday, June 10th, following a long illness. Dan was born in New York, NY and raised in Montclair, NJ. 

Dan received his BA from Dartmouth College in 1962. After completing his doctorate at Yale University in 1968, where Adam Parry in particular was a great influence, he taught first at Wesleyan University (1965–1973) and then Swarthmore College (1974–1976), before finally landing at Temple University. In between Wesleyan and Swarthmore, he was a fellow at the Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C.

Temple’s small Classics department had disappeared in the early 1970s when its faculty departed in a burst of mid-career changes, but then, after a hiatus, faculty in other departments asked Temple’s administration for its return. Dan was hired to resurrect the discipline here from scratch. While this was certainly no small task, Dan, with a legendarily wide-ranging intellect and boundless energy, was ideally suited to this project. His gentle humility and warm, optimistic humanity generated both respect in and affection from others. Dan’s first hire, in 1978, was Martha Davis, and together they forged a student-centered culture that persists to this day. While Dan retired from teaching in 2010, his intellectual DNA has proven remarkably durable in the department.

His magnanimity touched many, as Associate Professor Karen Hersch recalls:

His generosity and goodness to us truly knew no bounds. Some recent kindnesses to us here at Temple: In 2021 and 2022, he graciously agreed to speak as part of our panels on diversity and justice, “Teaching Race in the Ancient Mediterranean at Temple.” I saw him last in person at our winter holiday party, and he was profoundly grateful to be there–suffused with light is an understatement—and all he could talk about was how amazed he was to see such happy, excited and involved students. I was delighted that he continued to write me to share wonderful musings and citations, and I was humbled that he would ask me questions. His last email to me was typical of him, quintessential Dan: he sent me congratulations on our Carleton-Temple conference on women, and added that he wished he had more time with my younger colleagues. We will cherish those words.

Dan’s affable curiosity and concern for his students also made him an outstanding teacher. He was recognized for this work twice: first, with the Excellence in Teaching Award from the American Philological Association in 1980, and, second, with Temple University’s Great Teacher Award in 2009.

Dan wore many different hats at Temple, especially during the latter part of his career when the department’s growth allowed him to spread his wings a bit. He was one of the founders of Temple’s core humanities program, Intellectual Heritage, and served as its director twice (1980–1983, 2000–2005). In between, his passion for student learning led him to the Provost’s office, where he worked as Faculty Fellow for Learning Communities (1993–2000), while also serving on important committees, often chairing them.

The burden of this important work meant that Dan usually did not have enough time for his own research. That said, what he did manage to complete is generally still considered to be significant, especially his work on Thucydides, which is still cited regularly (e.g. “Stylistic Characterization in Thucydides: Nicias and Alcibiades,” Yale Classical Studies: Studies in Fifth Century Thought and Literature, ed. Adam Parry, 22 [1972], pp. 181–214”). After retiring from teaching, Dan pursued his passionate interest in the work of Moses Finley and his intellectual circle, about which he had earlier already published (“The World of Moses Finkelstein: The Year 1939 in M.I. Finley’s Development as a Historian,” Chapter in Michael Meckler, ed., Classical Antiquity and the Politics Of America. Baylor State University Press, 2006. Pp. 95–126). His keen interest in pedagogy and work on learning communities also led to a half-dozen related articles.

Dan had an astonishing range of interests and was capable of enthusiastic and insightful discussion about everything from Wallace Stevens to Thucydides to the Philadelphia Eagles. Many people, both at Temple and around the world, regularly woke up to find a long e-mail message from Dan composed at some odd hour during the night when he had become excited after reading an article about a subject that you had no idea was an concern of his. Such messages persisted to the end of his life.

He is survived by his wife Drew Humphries, his sister Tory Byrne, his daughter Tory Tompkins, and his grandson Tristan. 

Daniel Tompkins was a remarkable intellect, a terrific teacher, a tremendous colleague, and, most importantly, a great human being. May his memory be a blessing. 

Remembering Dan Tompkins, by Martha Davis, Associate Professor Emerita 

Most persons hearing about the death of Dan Tompkins will immediately regret the loss of continued research by him into the work of Thucydides and Finley. He was the expert par excellence in that. But his inquisitive mind ranged over a much wider territory, both of the ancient world and our modern one. He had a prodigious memory and read constantly, so his command of knowledge broadened continuously.

I remember his mastery of the field of Classics, but also his willingness to share what he knew. He answered my questions many times—patiently¬–and often brought me articles and information he knew I would be interested in. His comments for the listserv Classics-L were perceptive and could provoke lively discussion.

Dan was a good colleague and an outstanding chair of the department he founded. He never shrank from administrative duties and service to the university far beyond our department level. His many honors were well deserved. He pioneered in the development of the Freshman Interdisciplinary Studies Program and was almost solely responsible for creating and maintaining the Intellectual Heritage Program, both of which introduced beginning students to basic knowledge necessary for success in any major. 

From a personal standpoint, I thank him first of all that I was hired. He worked to see me through tenure, and I owe him much in the consideration of my own career. He thought it fun that our birthdays were very close together and did not forget to mark the days. The spoon rest on my kitchen counter in the shape of a fish was a small gift from him, one that reminds me daily of his thoughtfulness. He helped me move household—twice. Most of all, he cheered me up. Though I groaned loudly at his awful puns, they punctuated even the dreariest days with humor. The smell of his French press coffee still drifts through my memory of the department.

My own sorrow is great, so it is difficult even to imagine how his death has affected Drew and Tory and the rest of his family. Friends and acquaintances will miss him, and those who knew him only by his work will sense that an important voice is stilled. When we celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of the Department of Greek and Roman Classics, we presented Dan with a medal. The inscription remains appropriate to this day for those who worked with him: Sine quo non.

The 2023 Fall Annual Meeting of The Classical Association of the Atlantic States

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When: Thursday, October 5 to Saturday, October 7

Where:  The Inn at Penn, Philadelphia, PA

Program: Click here to read/download the final version of the Program (updated October 20, 2023)

Letter from CAAS President: Click here to view/download the Letter from the CAAS President

Letter from CAAS Executive Director: Click here to view/download the Letter from the CAAS Executive Director

Election/Ballot Form: Voting deadline has passed.

Exhibitors and Vendors:  Meeting has ended.

Fall 2023 Registration Form (register online): Meeting has ended.

Reservations link for the Inn at Penn: Meeting has ended.

Travel Subsidy Program Application: Submissions are now closed for 2023.

We look forward to seeing you there!