Women in Ancient Greece and Rome
Important Information

Source Use and Citation Exercise

Goal:  The purpose of this exercise is to have practice (and get feedback from me) on how to argue a point from both primary and secondary sources, and how to cite primary sources in particular.  Your goal: to use at least two primary source passages and one secondary source to argue a specific point. 

Length:  2 pages (more or less), double spaced

Due date: Thursday, Sept. 27

Topic:

Compare the lives of hetairai and married citizen women in Athens, 6^th-4^th centuries BCE, with special attention to a particular area and/or set of ideas.  Consider such elements as:

• economic standing/security

• physical experience of the world

• relationships with men

• obligations and necessities

• religious life

• sources of self-esteem

• slavery vs. freedom

Go beyond a contrast (because there are obviously a lot of oppositions) but also look for the underlying factors of culture that might provide similarities as well.

Support your opening thesis with evidence and/or quotations from at least 2 primary sources and at least 1 secondary source

Primary source passages:  Any of the passages that concern either hetairai or married women in Fantham and in L&F.

Secondary sources: Use one of the two book chapters linked below.

• Blundell, Sue.  Women in Ancient Greece. Harvard Unniversity Press, 1995.

• Pomeroy, Sarah.  Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves.  New York: Schocken Books, 1975.

Citation

Your textbooks, in which the primary source quotes can be found, give you the proper way to cite the passages they quote. 

In the body of the paper, cite the source parenthetically.  Example:

A charater in a lost comedy argues that a hetaira is “more well-intentioned than a wedded wife” (Amphis, Fr. 1 PCG.G).

Note that the period comes after the citation.

In the Works Cited, list the ancient author as the author, the ancient text as the text.  Then add, “Quoted in” and give the secondary source reference.  Example:

Amphis, Fr. 1.  Quoted in Mary R. Lefkowitz and Maureen B. Fant.  2005. Women’s Life in Greece and Rome, 3^rd. ed.  Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.

Procedure:  

• Since you are already familiar with the primary source material,  review it and see if you find issues that you want do discuss and/or learn more about. 

• Read through the potential secondary sources for material or perspectives that help develop your interest into a related range of ideas.  Bear in mind that you are trying to find an angle for the comparison in specific areas and on specific grounds (though you will want to cast light on the relationship more generally as well).

• When you write, you will want a coherent thesis statement that balances the lives of Athenian married women and prostitutes in a particular perspective that you can argue from the sources.

• Use specific quotes from the primary sources to support the point.

• Work in a comment from Blundell or Pomeroy, either shortly following the thesis statement (if the author makes a specific point you want to follow through on your own treatment of primary sources) or in the course of arguing your own point.

• When you use primary source quotes, be sure to point out the implications of each source you quote – make sure you make it clear to me what point you are using the quote to support.

• You can use 5-10 line quotes and discuss them as a whole (pointing out specific elements) or you can make your argument central and work in shorter quotes that illustrate your point.  For examples of these writing techniques, see Using Quotes.  For a professional example of both strategies, see Achilles in Vietnam chapter 3.

• For general hints on writing in general and writing from ancient primary sources in particular, see Miscellaneous Writing Guidelines.

Essay

Goal:  The purpose of this exercise is to smoothly integrate primary and (if you find it helpful) secondary sources with your own views on a specific topic.   You must use at least three primary sources in your discussion, incorporating them smoothly in service of the points you wish to make.  In this assignment, your own perspective is dominant, but you must show that your perspective is an educated one through use of primary sources, and you must be persuasive in supporting and arguing it.

Length:  2 -3 pages (more or less), double spaced

Due date: Tuesday, Nov. 1

Requirements:  Use at least 3 primary sources in your discussion of ONE of the topics below.

Topic: Choose one of the following topics

Athenian Drama: What kinds of power did Athenian theater portray in women?  We have seen Medea, whose intelligence and destructive power are substantial, and  Lysistrata, who (in a comic context) uses sex to maipulate men into women's desire to have them home from the wars.  We have also seen other female characters (in excerpts): Andromache, Phaedra, etc.  What is "empowering" about these roles, and what illustrates or defines the inherent limitations in women's lives in Athens?  And what sorts of elements of the situations and outcomes undermine the "empowerment?  Consider both the emic (within the culture, e.g. what a woman with the Athenian life experience might think) and etic (from outside the culture, e.g. interpretations applying our own concepts, intellectual or personal) perspectives.  How well do these characters transfer into modern life?

Amazons: Amazons, although they are ultimately shown in defeat, still play a key role in the ways in which women are conceived of in Greek society.  In what ways do Amazons represent, for men and (to the extent you can extrapolate) for women, positive and negative roles for women?  Consider (not necessarily in only positive or negative terms) the roles of conflict, gender definition and transgression, eroticism. 

Hellenistic Queens:  Both Cleopatra and Berenice are presented as attractive women -- but what sort of attraction do they offer?  Using the sources from your textbooks (and anything else you care to explore), discuss the nature of these queens as they are portrayed in the sources.  Be alert to the fact that the queens are portrayed by sources that have an agenda, and may portray more than real difference in the "personal styles" of the queens.  In what ways did Cleopatra and Berenike capture the public interest of their times?  How does tehir portrayal relate to the expectations of ordinary women -- and how much of the dynamic of their portrayals transfer into today's world?

Research Paper Guidelines

Length: 4-5 pages.

Paper Proposal: Due Nov. 20: A page describing the topic you will address, giving a tentative thesis, and giving two primary and two secondary cources you will use in writing your paper.  This is only a proposal, but it gives me a chance to give you advice, resources, and general guidance about how to approach, limit, or expand your topic.

Paper Due: Dec. 6

Topics:

Anything to do with women or gender issues in the ancient Greek or Roman worlds.

You should consult me briefly about your paper topic before you begin working on it. Allow yourself enough time to research your topic thoroughly -- there may be competition for resources close to the due dates.

You might consider such topics as:

• women's roles in a religious ritual
  • marriage
  • funerals
  • Thesmophoria
  • worship of Dionysus, Artemis, Hera, or any deity for that matter
• women's legal status
  • property rights
  • dowry issues
  • mechanisms for managing legal problems
• women's economy
• women's representation in art (focus on one area, time frame or medium, e.g. red-figure vases)
• women's illnesses and medical treatment
• prostitution
• different statuses of freedom and slavery 
• representations of women in comedy or drama (including specific plays, or characters in different plays)
• women's literacy
• etc.

Be Specific: Bear in mind that this course covers a lot of time and a wide geographical region.  You will want to be specific. For example, "Greek women" is better than "ancient women," "fifth century Athenian women" is better than "Greek women," and "poor fifth-century Athenian women" is very specific and therefore the most effective sort of discussion you can pursue.

Research:  The paper should show a knowledge of your subject which is either wide-ranging or detailed (preferably both), and should also show some personal thought.  When planning your research, consider the following:

• Consult at least five sources, of which at least 4 must be either academic books, or articles on a university-approved, refereed Internet forum (such as Diotima's essays or articles from JSTOR or another academic archive).
• Make sure that primary sources are included in your work.  In many sorts of paper it is a good idea to make one primary source a focus of your research, and use other primary sources and secondary sources to illustrate it.  (For example, focus on Herodotus' description of Amazons and use other materials to explore the historical or sociological function or meaning of the story; or study how Helen of Troy is portrayed in Euripides' Helen, and compare this with other ancient portrayals, using secondary sources for insight into literary conventions.)  Literature and art-focused projects clearly include primary sources; see me if you wonder how to use (or find) such sources.
• There is a standard way of citing Classical primary sources, which you must follow when you use them in your paper.  This method is detailed at UNC-Chapel Hill's IAM site. 
• For a general guide on citing other kinds of sources, see Haverford College's Guide to Citing Sources in Classics.
• Include a Bibliography/Works Cited list.

When looking over your paper, consider the following (because I will!):

• Have you done enough research? Have you used the resources available to you to find out all you needed to make this an effective and informed presentation?
• Have you used primary sources? And when you follow an argument by modern authors, are you aware of the primary sources on which they have based their conclusions?  Are you sensitive to the possible agendas of your sources, and able to consider these in evaluating them?
• Are you guiding the progress of your research? That is, do you follow the "topic boundaries" of other peoples' discussions, or do your own questions lead you to your configuration of the issues you discuss?  Do you have an approach to your topic that distinguishes it from what someone else might write?
• Are you applying the perspectives and principles we have considered in this course in your treatments of your topic?
• Are you able to explain your ideas and argue your positions from a knowledge of the critical issues in your topic?
• Have you stated your thesis clearly, and constructed your arguments so they proceed effectively?  If one of your classmates read your paper, would s/he be convined by your argument?
• Do you meet the technical criteria of length and format?

These papers should have the mark of your intelligence, your interests, and your ideology, on them, but they are first and foremost research papers. I will want to see that you have endeavored to present an accurate and well-informed discussion of a particular area of ancient women’s lives. Use the resources of this library and the Internet, especially the Diotima web site (which will often refer you to library resources).  If you are having difficulty finding information, come to me; I can help you find other resources.

For a list of beautifully formulated topics (to inspire your own research) try M. Katz's course site.

Rubric for Research Papers

This is an extensive rubric, but it expresses the elements I use in assessing papers.  Every paper is not the same and excellence can be achieved in different ways, so the rubric is also a guide for what I consider excellence and what I consider unaccaptable.