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            Carey Perloff, classicist and artistic director emerita of the American Conservatory Theatre, relates that “…[i]t worries me that we’re losing classical theater in this country because people think that it’s old white men…5th Century Athens was not white, or all white, there were Egyptians, there were Persians—we are naïve that way in the judgements that we make.”

The Poetics, Œdipos Tyrannos, Medea, The Frogs. This is a general pathway for which the undergraduate theatre history course is built upon: Aristotle’s formula for the ideal tragedy, his paradigm from Sophokles, a challenge to the formula from Euripides, and a pageant of tragedy from Aristophanes’ comedy. This typically provides a relatively easy framework for the rest of the course literature to be referenced against. However, the trouble with using this route is that the historiographic tradition it shapes does not align with the social community into which Attic drama was produced. Its effect on theatre history curricula has fundamentally whitewashed the historical background of the Ancient Mediterranean.

            In 1987, Martin Bernal published Black Athena, his three-volume defense of the Afro-asiatic cultural influence that is present in the anthropological evidence of Ancient Greece. Among other cases, he claimed that sites like Krete and Thebes were showgrounds for cultural contact between the native, Egyptian, and Semitic populaces. Though the evidence Bernal presents has been disproved as archaeologically sound, the heart of his arguments is that “…it is virtually impossible to prove absence” (9). The critiques, as McCoskey describes, became overwhelmingly concerned over negating the facts of Bernal’s argument without accepting the ethnic diversity that was present—and suffused—within the Ancient Mediterranean, citing how responses to Black Athena ultimately rang “so personally.” Nevertheless, if the cultural makeup of the ancient audience was ethnically diverse, then the logic stands that the drama based on such a community reflected as much of an ethnically diverse cast of characters, bringing themes of slavery, intermarriage, and nationalism to the table.

            This presentation offers an alternative approach toward teaching Attic Greek drama in theatre history classes that provides students with a racially diversified conception of the Greek stage and audience. First, additional material from Aristotle will be examined as adjunct resources in service of developing a more rounded background into the prejudices of the Athenian citizen. Additional video resources like those of Edith Hall and the aforementioned Carey Perloff also provide sharp critique of the friction whitewashing traditions enact with the anthropological fabric of the Ancient Mediterranean. Second, the drama selections will be recontextualized not as static texts, locked in a single historical setting, but rather as motivated stencils for interpretation by a multilingual and multiethnic audience of today—featuring insights from Margherita Laera, Carla Della Gatta, and Luis Alfaro. Lastly, an example of a final unit project will be analyzed for its effectiveness in developing for students a diverse understanding of the community into which the drama of this unit premiered.