COURSE DESCRIPTION

Comparative study of roles of women and gender in the ancient world. We will examine the roles of women in the family and in society in general, as well as women in positions of political power. The civilizations we will be looking at are from ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Rome.

COURSE GOALS

Students will develop an understanding of the roles and the perceptions of women in some ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Rome. Students will increase their ability to read and analyze both ancient sources and modern scholarship. They will practice critical thinking, and the expression of critical thinking in both the spoken and the written form. Special emphasis will be placed on refining the ability to develop a thesis, support it with specific evidence and to analyze that evidence logically and critically.

COURSE TEXTS

All texts for this course are available on Electronic Reserve at Morgan library unless otherwise indicated. Those items marked with an asterisk (*) are also available in hard copy at the reserve desk at Morgan. Additional items are available on the World Wide Web at the sites indicated on the course schedule. Please note that you do not have to print out modern texts if you do not want to, but you must come to class with copies of the ancient texts in hand. To avoid confusion, the schedule indicates when a text is ancient and when it is modern.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

The course requirements consist of four elements:

JOURNAL: Students are required to attend class, participate in discussion, and keep a journal based on the reading and discussions. Journal entries will be both formal and informal. Journals will be collected periodically throughout the semester. Also, journals must be brought to class regularly for in-class writing assignments.

GROUP PRESENTATION: Students will work in small groups to prepare and give a 15 - 20 minute oral presentation based on additional readings.

EXAMS: There will be one midterm exam and one final exam. The midterm exam will include a take home portion (a two page essay, typed in 12 point font) and an in-class portion (short i.d.s and a passage interpretation). The final exam will include an in-class essay, passage interpretation and i.d.s (worth 50%, 35% and 15% respectively). On the written exams there will be choices in all categories.

PARTICIPATION: Formal and informal conversations will be occurring in class throughout the semester. You must engage in these conversations, and in the process demonstrate three things: you have read the material you are talking about, you have thought about it, and you have listened to what your colleagues in class have said about it. If participation in class discussion is a fate worse than death for you, then you must stop by my office during the first two weeks of the semester to arrange an alternative form of communication.

EVALUATION

35% JOURNAL
20% ORAL PRESENTATION
30% EXAMS
15% PARTICIPATION

RULES

Academic honesty is a requirement of this course. Please see my policy.

Inform the professor in advance (or as close to that as possible) if you are going to be unable to fulfill an obligation.

Do not ask the professor what happened in a class that you missed. Contact another student for that information. Feel free, however, to ask the professor to explain something from a class that you did attend or from the reading.