Course Information

Contact Information

• sticky - Please note the new phone number.  Some (or all) of the syllabi distributed during the first day of class are already out of date.  DO NOT TELEPHONE THE WRITING CENTER to reach me.  If you MUST telephone, use 334-1413.
• 4/23 - reading schedule has been slightly revised.  expect reading quizzes every day from here on out!

Course Description

This course was designed both for majors and non-majors with cursory knowledge of Greek Drama at the sophomore level.  Although this is primarily a literature course, it approaches Greek Drama from anthropological and historical perspectives (among others).  That is to say, Greek Tragedy & Comedy were very particular events and occurred during specific historical moments.  A detailed understanding of the moment in which these plays were produced (the socio-political climate, etc.) is necessary to uncovering [some of] the "meanings" embedded within each particular play.  Of course, the idea that there are specific meanings that readers can decode from texts is problematic in and of itself, saying nothing for the difficulty of defining what the term "meaning" means.  Nevertheless, this class will address these and other theoretical problems within the context of Greek Drama and a few selected historical & analytical texts (Aristotle, Barry S. Strauss, Thucydides).  Familiarity with specific literary theories is NOT a prerequisite for this course.  However, the introduction of various [conflicting] theories, in addition to the analytical texts that I will provide for you, is certainly a component of this course.  In taking CLC 223L, students will learn to analyze Greek dramatic texts on a critical level and demonstrate this ability in either two take-home examinations or one take-home examination and a 5-10 page term paper.

Historically speaking, Greek Drama did not suddenly appear out of the ether.  It evolved out of Greek culture in the specific historical moment of the 5th Century.  In fact, we can narrow this moment even further by speaking of 5th Century Athens, since the only extant Greek Dramas came from 5th Century Athens.  While Tragedy is an earlier dramatic form than Comedy, its roots can be traced further, to other forms of Greek ritual and poetry.  Specifically, Tragedy is often compared to and contrasted with Epic.  Certainly, Epic poetry (a form of lyric poetry) was the dominant art form before Tragedy and, later, Comedy took "center stage."  Thus, for a more accurate understanding of the historical moment that was 5th Century Athenian Tragedy, it stands to reason that Epic poetry ought to be considered in our analysis of Greek Drama.  Since the Iliad was the most lasting and impressionable Epic (lyric) poem whose story was known to all Hellens (Greeks), we will use it as a barometer with which to gauge the socio-cultural shift that took place in the early 5th Century that gave rise to Tragedy.  From Tragedy, we will move into more traditionally historical texts (because such things had also come into being during the 5th Century) in order to better understand the sociopolitical climate in which Aristophanes wrote his comedies: the atmosphere of The Peloponnesian War.  After our short digression in historical documents, we will explore the comedies of Aristophanes.

GENERAL EDUCATION CATEGORY: HUMANITIES

This course fulfills the General Education requirement for Humanities, and as such, the following guidelines apply:

Characteristics of all General Education Courses

1. General Education courses offer introductions to the central topics of disciplines and interdisciplinary fields.
2. General Education courses offer explicit rather than tacit understandings of the procedures, practices, methodology and fundamental assumptions of disciplines and interdisciplinary fields.
3. General Education courses recognize multiple perspectives on the subject matter.
4. General Education courses emphasize active learning in an engaged environment that enables students to be producers as well as consumers of knowledge.
5. General Education courses promote critical inquiry into the assumptions, goals, and methods of various fields of academic study; they aim to develop the interpretive, analytic, and evaluative competencies characteristic of critical thinking.

Learning Objectives for General Education Humanities Courses

Humanities courses teach students to analyze and interpret texts, ideas, artifacts, and discourse systems, and the human values, traditions, and beliefs that they reflect.

1. Humanities courses enable students to demonstrate knowledge of the assumptions, methods of study, and theories of at least one of the disciplines within the humanities.

Depending on the discipline, humanities courses will enable students to demonstrate some or all of the following:

2. an understanding of the objects of study as expressions of the cultural contexts of the people who created them
3. an understanding of the continuing relevance of the objects of study to the present and to the world outside the university
4. an ability to employ the terms and understand the conventions particular to the discipline
5. an ability to analyze and assess the strengths and weaknesses of ideas and positions along with the reasons or arguments that can be given for and against them
6. an understanding of the nature of the texts, artifacts, ideas, or discourse of the discipline and of the assumptions that underlie this understanding, including those relating to issues of tradition and canon

Requirements & Grading Policies

Grading

1. Class participation - participating in class discussion and completing assigned readings; attendance will be taken by a short answer question based on the readings assigned for discussion on the given class meeting; these short answer questions will be collected and account for your class participation grade (10%)
2. Midterm - short answer & essay take-home exam (40%)
3. Final exam - short answer & essay take-home exam OR 5-10 page paper on topic approved by instructor (50%)

Student Expectations

• Attendance - Attendance IS mandatory.  Students shall be permitted a maximum of 3 unexcused absences.  Every subsequent absence will result in the lowering of your final grade by 1/3 of a letter grade (e.g., an A would become a B+).  This policy will be in effect up to 6 absences; after the 6th absence, offending students will receive a failing grade for the course.
• Class handouts - Throughout the semester, I will distribute critical essays that deal with various aspects of Greek Tragedy & Comedy.  It is the students' responsibility to obtain a copy of these essays if absent and to be prepared (having read them) for the appropriate class meetings.
• Online assignments - In lieu of distributing physical copies of handouts, certain reading assignments may be posted on the class web site.  Students are expected to read them for the appropriately assigned class meetings.  You can, of course, print them so that you have your own physical copy on which to take notes (I recommend it), but I will not be supplying physical handouts for these required readings.

Required Texts

Required books for this course have been ordered both through Mary Jane Books and the School Bookstore. 

• Aristotle, Poetics ISBN: 0807842036
• Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War ISBN: 0872203948
• Strauss, Barry S., Fathers and Sons in Athens: Ideology and Society in the Era of the Peloponnesian War ISBN: 0691015910
• Sophocles, The Theban Plays (Oedipus Tyrannous, Oedipus at Colonus, Antigone) ISBN: 0679431322
• Aeschylus, The Orestia (Agamemnon, The Libation-Bearers, The Furies) ISBN: 0374527059
• Euripides, The Bacchae, The Hippolytus ISBN: 0451527003
• Aristophanes, The Clouds, The Frogs, The Lysistrata ISBN: 0452007178
• Homer, The Iliad ISBN: 0140445927

Plagiarism

"Don't let plagiarism happen to you!"

The following spiel on plagiarism comes straight from the University at Albany's Undergraduate Bulletin.  Students should familiarize themselves with these guidelines because they apply unilaterally to ALL University at Albany students whether the students are aware of these guidelines or not:

The University at Albany expects all members of its community to conduct themselves in a manner befitting its tradition of honor and integrity. They are expected to assist the University by reporting suspected violations of academic integrity to appropriate faculty and/or administration offices. Behavior that is detrimental to the University's role as an educational institution is unacceptable and requires attention by all citizens of its community.

Presenting as one's own work the work of another person (for example, the words, ideas, information, data, evidence, organizing principles, or style of presentation of someone else). Plagiarism includes paraphrasing or summarizing without acknowledgment, submission of another student's work as one's own, the purchase of prepared research or completed papers or projects, and the unacknowledged use of research sources gathered by someone else. Failure to indicate accurately the extent and precise nature of one's reliance on other sources is also a form of plagiarism. The student is responsible for understanding the legitimate use of sources, the appropriate ways of acknowledging academic, scholarly, or creative indebtedness, and the consequences for violating University regulations.

EXAMPLES OF PLAGIARISM INCLUDE:  failure to acknowledge the source(s) of even a few phrases, sentences, or paragraphs; failure to acknowledge a quotation or paraphrase of paragraph-length sections of a paper; failure to acknowledge the source(s) of a major idea or the source(s) for an ordering principle central to the paper's or project's structure; failure to acknowledge the source (quoted, paraphrased, or summarized) of major sections or passages in the paper or project; the unacknowledged use of several major ideas or extensive reliance on another person's data, evidence, or critical method; submitting as one's own work, work borrowed, stolen, or purchased from someone else.

for a detailed explanation of the Standards of Academic Integrity at the University at Albany, see the following link: https://www.albany.edu/undergraduate_bulletin/regulations.html.