THE CLASSICAL WORLD OF GREECE AND ROME

Instructor: J. Mark Sugars, Ph.D. Office: MHB 611

Section 02 = Class #1738; Room = LA5-355; Meeting Time = MWF 1000-1050

Course description:
This is a general education course designed to introduce you to the literature, art, history
and culture of the ancient Greek and Roman world. We will be looking at and discussing
a variety of sources, especially ancient literary texts, to become acquainted with these
civilizations; we will also look at how people of later times have interpreted and
reinterpreted the cultural heritage of Greece and Rome. We shall explore the ways in
which the ancients have influenced our modern world, and we shall consider how our
knowledge of them may help us to understand our own times.

Required texts: Homer, The Essential Homer (translated by Stanley Lombardo);

We may be viewing photos in class, as well as scenes from several films, including,
tentatively: The Western Tradition, The Greek Temple, Gladiators, Alexander the Great,
and The 300 Spartans.

There are many sites on the Internet devoted to ancient Greek and Roman civilization.
Some of your assignments in this class will involve studying specific materials on
particular websites, and doing research on the Internet as well as in a conventional
library.

Grading: Students will be responsible for all material presented in the readings, lectures,
and visual presentations, and for participating in class discussion. There will be several
opportunities, which I will announce and describe in class, for students to get extra credit
this semester.

Your grade will be based on:

Tests in my class are somewhat cumulative, but emphasizing the most recently-learned
material. They will usually take the form of short quizzes, which I will give at the end of
class, about every other week. There will be true/false, short answer, quotation-
identification and multiple-choice type questions based on reading and lectures; no, you
will not need Scan-trons; yes, I will usually warn you when I have planned a quiz for
the following class session. From time to time I will post study guides on
BeachBoard.

The University’s Withdrawal Policy:

It is the responsibility of the student who wishes to withdraw from a class to do so.
Instructors are under no obligation to drop students who do not attend class, and it is not
my policy to do so. Withdrawing during the final four weeks of instruction is not
permitted except in cases such as accident or serious illness where the circumstances
causing the withdrawal are clearly beyond the student’s control and the assignment of a
grade of “Incomplete” is not practical. Ordinarily, withdrawal in this category will
involve total withdrawal from all classes, except that a “Credit/No Credit” grade or an
“Incomplete” may be assigned for courses in which sufficient work has been completed
to permit an evaluation to be made. Request for permission to withdraw under these
circumstances must be made in writing on forms available in Enrollment Services. The
requests and approvals will state the reasons for the withdrawal. These requests must be
approved by the instructor, department chairperson, and dean of the school. Copies of
such approvals are kept on file in Enrollment Services.

Tentative schedule of class discussion of assigned texts:

Week 1, August 31-Sept. 4: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. I.

Week 2, September 9-Sept. 11: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. II; Essential
Homer, Books 1-6, 8-9 and 11 of the Iliad.

Week 3, Sept. 14-Sept. 18: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. III; Essential Homer,
Books 12-16 and 18-24 of the Iliad.

Week 4, Sept. 21-Sept. 23 (Sept. 25 is a furlough day): Brief History of Ancient

Week 5, Sept. 28-Oct. 2: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. V; Essential Homer,
Books 13, 16-19 and 21-24 of the Odyssey; Hesiod passage in Loeb Classical Library
Reader.

Week 6, Oct. 5-Oct. 9: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. VI; Tyrtaeus selection on
BeachBoard; Pindar, Pausanias and Herodotus passages in Loeb Classical Library
Reader; 1st selections from Herodotus, On the War for Greek Freedom.

Week 7, Oct. 12-Oct. 16: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. VII; 2nd selections from
Herodotus, On the War for Greek Freedom; Pindar, First Olympian Ode on BeachBoard;
Sophocles, Euripides and Thucydides passages in Loeb Classical Library Reader.
Week 8, Oct. 19-Oct. 23: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. VIII; Sophocles, Oedipus
the King and Antigone; Aristophanes passage in Loeb Classical Library Reader.

Week 9, Oct. 26-Oct. 30: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. IX; Aristophanes’
Lysistrate, on BeachBoard; Xenophon, Plato, Aristotle and Callimachus passages in Loeb
Classical Library Reader.

Week 10, Nov. 2-Nov. 6: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. X & XI; Josephus,
Plutarch and Lucian passages in Loeb Classical Library Reader.

Week 11, Nov. 9-Nov. 13: Brief History of Ancient Greece, ch. XII; Terence, Cicero, and
Caesar passages in Loeb Classical Library Reader.

Week 12, Nov. 16-Nov. 20: Lucretius, Virgil and Horace passages in Loeb Classical
Library Reader.

Week 13, Nov. 23: Livy passage in Loeb Classical Library Reader; Tibullus poem on
BeachBoard.

Week 14, November 30-December 4: Propertius, Ovid, Manilius and Seneca passages
in Loeb Classical Library Reader.

Week 15, Dec. 8-Dec. 11 (December 7 is a furlough day): Pliny, Petronius, Pliny the
Younger, Juvenal, Apuleius and Jerome passages in Loeb Classical Library Reader.

There is a slight possibility that I may need you to read a few texts in addition to what I
have listed above; if there are any texts for you to read that are not in your course
textbooks or course packet, they will either be on BeachBoard or on the Perseus website:
www.perseus.tufts.edu/cache/perscoll_Greco-Roman.html.

In case some of you are curious about what I look for in your writing, I can tell
you that I grade according to a fairly standard grading rubric for essays, one that I first
became familiar with when I was a teaching assistant in the Humanities Core Course at
UC Irvine in 1989:
Letter Conceptual Thesis Development Structuring Language
Grades and Support
Offers cogent analysis, Essay Well-chosen examples; Appropriate, Uses sophisticated
shows command of controlled by persuasive reasoning clear and sentences
interpretive and conceptual clear, precise, used to develop and smooth effectively; usually
A tasks required by well-defined support thesis transitions; chooses words
assignment and course thesis; is consistently; uses arrangement of
aptly; observes
materials; ideas original, sophisticated quotations and citations paragraphs conventions of
often insightful, going in both effectively; causal seems written English and
beyond ideas discussed in statement and connections between particularly apt
manuscript format;
lecture and class insight ideas are evident makes few minor
or technical errors
Shows a good Clear, specific, Pursues thesis Distinct units of Some mechanical
understanding of the texts, argumentative consistently; develops thought in difficulties or
ideas and methods of the thesis central a main argument with paragraphs stylistic problems;
assignment; goes beyond to the essay; clear major points and controlled by may make
B the obvious; may contain may have left appropriate textual specific and occasional
one minor factual or minor terms evidence and supporting detailed topic problematic word
conceptual inconsistency undefined detail; makes an effort sentences; clear choices or
to organize paragraphs transitions awkward syntax
topically between errors; a few
developed, spelling or
cohering, and punctuation errors
logically or clichés; usually
arranged presents quotations
paragraphs that effectively
are internally
cohesive
Shows an understanding of General thesis Only partially develops Some awkward More frequent
the basic ideas and or controlling the argument; shallow transitions; wordiness; several
information involved in the idea; may not analysis; some ideas some brief, unclear or
assignment; may contain define several and generalizations weakly unified awkward
C some factual, interpretive, central terms undeveloped or or undeveloped sentences;
or conceptual errors unsupported; makes paragraphs; imprecise use of
limited use of textual arrangement words or over-
evidence; fails to may not appear reliance on passive
integrate quotations entirely natural; voice; one or two
appropriately contains major grammatical
extraneous errors (subject-
information verb agreement,
comma splice,
etc.); effort to
present quotations
accurately
Shows inadequate Thesis vague or Frequently only Simplistic, tends Some major
command of course not central to narrates; digresses from to narrate or grammatical or
materials or contains argument; one topic to another merely proofreading errors
significant factual and central terms without developing summarize; (subject-verb
D conceptual errors; does not not defined ideas or terms; makes wanders from agreement;
respond directly to the insufficient or awkward one topic to sentence
demands of the assignment; use of textual evidence another; fragments);
confuses some significant illogical language marred
ideas arrangement of by clichés,
ideas colloquialisms,
repeated inexact
word choices;
inappropriate
quotations or
citations format
 Writer has not understood No discernible Little or no No transitions; Numerous
lectures, readings, thesis development; may list incoherent grammatical errors
discussions, or assignment facts or misinformation; paragraphs; and stylistic
uses no quotations or suggests poor problems seriously
F fails to cite sources, or planning or no distract from the
plagiarizes serious argument
revision

On the subject of plagiarism mentioned above, there is a good description of what is and
is not plagiarism in the Schedule of Classes.