MIT Ancient & Medieval Studies Colloquium: Sarah Olsen (Williams College) & Naomi Weiss (Harvard University)
MIT's Ancient & Medieval Studies Colloquium presents, "An Orestes for the 21st Century: Commentary as Criticism and the Myth of Objectivity," a presentation by Sarah Olsen (Associate Professor of Classics at Williams College) & Naomi Weiss (Professor of the Classics at Harvard University).
Euripides’ Orestes, first produced in 408 BCE, was one of the most popular tragedies in the ancient Greek and Byzantine worlds. It is also a play suited to a range of current scholarly and cultural interests, from ancient music to queer reimaginations of antiquity to the construction of race in ancient Greece, while the ways it pushes the boundaries of form and genre look increasingly at home among today’s postmodern and experimental theater. At present, however, work on Orestes is hampered by the absence of a modern English commentary. In this talk, we will discuss our approach to creating such a commentary, as well as broader questions about the purpose, audience, and unexamined assumptions of the commentary as a…
Event Series (if not listed): MIT Ancient & Medieval Studies Colloquium.
Tuesday, December 2, 2025, 5:15 PM – 7:00 PM.
MIT; Building E51 (Tang Center), Rm. E51-275.
Metaphysics and Theology Workshop (Department of Philosophy, Harvard University)
Friday, December 5 | 8:30am - 4:30pm (Emerson 211)
Saturday, December 6 | 8:30am - 1:30pm (Robbins Library)
Speakers:
Julia Borcherding (Cambridge University), "Divine Minds: Leibniz on the imago Dei Thesis and the Commonwealth of Spirits"
Therese Cory (University of Notre Dame), "A Puzzle about Intellectual Memory: Three States of Mental Forms in Aquinas"
Sam Newlands (University of Notre Dame), "Panentheism, Idealism, and Monism"
Dominik Perler (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin), "One Substance and Many Attributes: Spinoza and the Scholastic Background“
Gonzalo Rodriguez-Pereyra (Oxford University), "What Kind of Trope Theorist Was Hume?"
Stephan Schmid (Universität Hamburg), "Spinoza’s Attributes as Ways of Being"
Organizers:
Clara Carus (Harvard University)
Jeff McDonough (Harvard University)
Co-Sponored by the Abigail Adams Institute and the Harvard Provostial Fund for the Arts and Humanities.
Friday, December 5, 2025, 8:30 AM – Saturday, December 6, 2025, 1:30 PM.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY; Emerson Hall Rm. 211 & Robbins Library.
New Approaches to Classics Lecture Series: Olaoluwatoni A. Alimi
"Augustine's Varieties of Natural Slavery."
Olaoluwatoni Alimi is an Assistant Professor in Religion and the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University.
This event is free and open to the public.
Augustine is typically interpreted as having denied that there are natural slaves. Against the common interpretation, I argue that Augustine affirmed three separate natural slavery theses (and rejected only one). Aspects of Augustine’s accounts of natural slavery were central to 17th-century English rationalizations for slavery. However, they also left open several lacunae that these pro-slavers turned to Aristotle to fill. The methods for filling these lacunae were in turn central to the legal codification of some modern notions of race, including three familiar features: first, that race is immutable; second, that race is inheritable; third, that blacks are deficient to whites.
Event Series (if not listed): New Approaches to Classics Lecture Series.
Monday, December 8, 2025, 5:30 PM – 7:30 PM.
BOSTON UNIVERSITY; 725 Commonwealth Ave. B18 (basement).
77th Latin Carol Celebration
MOX EST CELEBRANDUM!
You are invited to the 77th Annual Brown University Latin Carol Celebration!
This joyful program features seasonal readings by President Christina H. Paxson and members of the Department of Classics. Musical prelude and accompaniment by University Organist, Mark Steinbach, plus the Chattertocks’ rendition of The Twelve Days of Christmas and a special arrangement by the Brown Madrigal Singers.
Conducted entirely in Latin (with a bit of ancient Greek and Sanskrit). English translations are provided for those whose Latin is a little (or a lot!) rusty.
The Latin Carol Celebration is free and open to the public and lasts a little over an hour.
We are delighted to continue this time-honored tradition and look forward to seeing you there!
VENITE ~ AUDITE ~ CANTATE ~ OMNES.
Event contact to appear in listing: Classics_Department@Brown.edu.
Monday, December 8, 2025, 8:00 PM – 9:15 PM.
BROWN UNIVERSITY, Sayles Hall Auditorium. 81 Waterman St, Providence, RI 02912 & on Zoom.
For more info visit events.brown.edu. Walter Scheidel (Stanford University)
Harvard Classics Lectures
Title TBD.
Event contact to appear in listing: Contact: classics@fas.harvard.edu. Event Series: Harvard Classics Departmental Seminar Series.
Tuesday, January 27, 2026, 3:00 PM – 4:15 PM.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY, TBD.
Workshop: Scott McGill and Susannah Wright (Rice University)
Harvard Classics Lectures
Dr. Susannah Wright and Dr. Scott McGill will talk about their new translation of the Aeneid, published by W. W. Norton in August 2025, and lead a public workshop.
Event Series: Mahindra Humanities Center Seminar: Rethinking Translation.
Thursday, February 19, 2026, 12:00 PM – 1:45 PM.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY, TBD, Cambridge, MA 02138.
For more info visit mahindrahumanities.harvard.edu. Lecture: Scott McGill and Susannah Wright (Rice University)
Harvard Classics Lectures
Dr. Susannah Wright and Dr. Scott McGill will talk about their new translation of the Aeneid, published by W. W. Norton in August 2025.
Event Series: Mahindra Humanities Center Seminar: Civilizations of Ancient Greece and Rome.
Thursday, February 19, 2026, 5:30 PM – 7:00 PM.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY, TBD, Cambridge, MA 02138.
For more info visit mahindrahumanities.harvard.edu.