Alice König (University of St Andrews)
My paper will discuss a new undergraduate module which I have recently set up at the University of St Andrews, entitled ‘Modern Classics: Applications and Interventions’. It is a ‘Living Lab’-style module with a strong emphasis on helping students to develop as ‘citizen scholars’. Guest lecturers deliver workshops on (for example) ancient democracy and modern politics; ancient migration and modern refugee narratives; historic climate change and modern climate debates; ancient approaches to science and modern constructions of expertise; ancient and modern attitudes to race and gender. Inspired by these case studies, students then work in teams to identify a local, national or global challenge (e.g. ‘fake news’, intercultural tensions, the gender pay gap, the campaign for transgender rights, conflicting attitudes to free speech, the mix of myth and medical science in modern vaccination debates) and together research ways in which study of the ancient past might make a positive contribution to their chosen issue. We spend time examining the ethics and pitfalls of using material and models from the past as ‘interventions’ in modern-day problems and the applicability (or not) of ancient paradigms, with discussion of various ‘uses and abuses’ of antiquity along the way. Ultimately, student teams are challenged to devise and pitch a viable project of their own that will bring ancient knowledge/material to bear on a pressing modern problem. This module gives students new insights into the ancient world; it demands serious reflection on the state of Classics as a discipline (in particular, the urgent need for greater diversification and decolonisation); and it encourages and equips students to bring academic study and activism together. My talk will discuss what I learnt from teaching this module about the ways in which we can draw on the ancient world to address modern issues, and also what I learnt about how (and how important it is that) we teach our students to do so.