Module CLAS3851: Ancient Slavery

Department: Classics and Ancient History

CLAS3851: Ancient Slavery

Prerequisites

• None

Corequisites

• None

Excluded Combination of Modules

• None

Aims

• To explore the varied and complex issues entangled with the practices of enslavement in Greek and Roman societies.
• To explore and evaluate a range of theoretical and methodological perspectives from which slavery is studied and modelled.
• To study and analyse (in translation) a wide variety of sources, both textual and material, relevant to the study of slavery in the Mediterranean world, between the archaic period and late antiquity.

Content

• Slavery permeated every aspect of ancient Greek and Roman culture and society. Ancient authors constantly drew on it for their philosophical arguments and literary constructions, even as the great majority of them exploited the labour of enslaved people in their households. The historiography of enslavement has recently seen a surge of studies and approaches, which aim to retrieve the lived experience of enslaved people in a number of domains, and illuminate the complex dynamics that shaped their place in society. This module aims to equip students with core knowledge and methodological and theoretical approaches needed for the interdisciplinary study of slavery in the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Students will explore and analyse a range of aspects of enslavement practices: the conceptualisation of slavery, the significance of enslaved labour for the economy, the presence and role of enslaved members of the household, the contribution of enslaved people to literary production, and so on. At the same time, students will be introduced to and encouraged critically to engage with, the principal modern theoretical and methodological approaches which have dominated work in the field, including the historiography of 'slave economies'; comparative historiography of slavery across different cultures, including New World contexts; the representation and elision of enslavement in the public reception of antiquity, and so on. The overall chronological scope of the module is 600 BCE–400 CE, but may be narrower in any given year depending on the precise topics covered.

Learning Outcomes

• Detailed knowledge of a range of case studies relevant to understanding slavery in Greek and Roman antiquity.
• Familiarity with a range of relevant literary, epigraphic, numismatic, archaeological and visual sources, and associated modern scholarship.
• An understanding of scholarly debates surrounding ancient slavery, and the major methodological and theoretical positions taken by scholars working in this field.
• An appreciation and critical reflection of how ancient slavery is presented and constructed in the public sphere, including the media.

• Ability to evaluate in an analytically sophisticated way a range of source materials which shed light on the nature of slavery.
• Ability to make appropriate use of relevant subject-specific reference and bibliographic tools.
• Ability to produce interdisciplinary work that combines philosophical debates, modern historiography, and social, economic, and cultural history.

• Ability to analyse a wide range of source material in an intellectually sophisticated and methodologically sound way.
• Ability to assess critically a range of different methodologies and theoretical approaches.
• Ability to produce a range of assessment outputs and communicate their contents in a clear and well-structured fashion.
• Capacity to produce independent, persuasive and clearly formulated arguments in both oral and written form.

Modes of Teaching, Learning and Assessment and how these contribute to the learning outcomes of the module

• Teaching will be by lectures and seminars.
• The seminar sessions will be three for each term.
• Formative assessment will be chosen by the students.
• Summative assessment will be in a portfolio format. The students will be given the opportunity to choose a combination from a range of possible assessments (poster, creative translation, essay, project, reflective journal, short article, etc.), adding up to 100%.

Teaching Methods and Learning Hours

Summative Assessment

Formative Assessment:

To be chosen by the student

■ Attendance at all activities marked with this symbol will be monitored. Students who fail to attend these activities, or to complete the summative or formative assessment specified above, will be subject to the procedures defined in the University's General Regulation V, and may be required to leave the University