
- UCAS course code
- VV20
- UCAS institution code
- M20
Course unit details:
The Roman Outlook: Hellenisation & Roman Values
Unit code | CAHE31432 |
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Credit rating | 20 |
Unit level | Level 3 |
Teaching period(s) | Semester 2 |
Offered by | Classics, Ancient History & Egyptology |
Available as a free choice unit? | Yes |
Overview
The course examines aspects of Roman society in the Late Republic and early Empire, with emphasis on the period 100 BC- AD 100. Approximately the first third of the course deals with Roman values (e.g. aspects of the aristocratic ethic) and cultural attitudes and the reaction to the increasing hellenisation of Roman society in the later Republic. The rest of the course builds on these foundations and looks at individual areas of Roman life in the light of these values. Specific areas may include aspects of philosophy and religion, medicine, agriculture and seafaring, and the Roman games.
Pre/co-requisites
No pre-requisites, although CAHE 10022 Republic to Empire and/or CAHE 20051 Rome’s Golden Age are helpful.
No co-requisites.
Anti-requisites: CAHE 21432 Roman Outlook (level 2 version)
Aims
To offer Level 3 undergraduate students the opportunity to study aspects of Roman society in a crucial period of cultural transition. At Level 3, a broader and more complex core of texts than at Level 2 will include a selection which introduces more sophisticated or controversial issues surrounding the topics covered.
Knowledge and understanding
By the end of this course, students will be able to:
- identify a range of cultural attitudes and recognise their effects and that of a response to the influence of Hellenic culture, in a number of areas of Roman life;
- engage critically with a range of ancient evidence, including core texts, but also some more challenging extracts.
- demonstrate an understanding of the values which underpinned Roman society;
- recognise the complexities of interpreting ancient perceptions of societal change; in particular with reference to the effects, perceived or actual, of the increasing infiltration of Roman society by the Greeks and their culture.
Intellectual skills
In keeping with the broader range of texts, including more complex examples, which students at level 3 will have studied, they are expected to have gained a greater level of sophistication and breadth of knowledge than those taking the course at level 2. By the end of this course, such students will be able to demonstrate an enhanced ability
- to perform close textual analysis and more broadly-based thematic readings;
- to evaluate critically both primary and secondary literature, including both basic and more complex readings;
- to deploy these skills in an efficient and sophisticated manner in partnership with other interpretative approaches in the elucidation of socio-historical issues and problems.
Practical skills
By the end of this course students will be able to:
- demonstrate good oral and written communication skills;
- take responsibility for individual learning;
- appreciate the views of individuals from different cultures.
Transferable skills and personal qualities
By the end of this course students will be able to:
- demonstrate the ability to construct an argument in written and oral form, to pose questions about complex issues;
- assimilate and summarise large quantities of evidence;
- locate and retrieve relevant information from primary sources;
- conduct bibliographic searches;
- present the results in a professional manner with appropriate reference to sources and modern published scholarship;
- use e-resources and gain knowledge of research methods and resources;
- manage time and resources;
- engage in critical discussion.
Employability skills
- Other
- By the end of this course, students will be able to demonstrate the acquisition of a portfolio of practical transferable skills: see above, Transferable Skills and Personal Qualities.
Assessment methods
Assessment task | Weighting within unit (if summative) |
Commentaries | 30% |
Essay | 30% |
Exam | 40% |
Feedback methods
Feedback method | Formative or Summative |
Written and oral feedback | Summative commentaries and essay |
Written and oral feedback | Formative tutorial work (practice commentaries/essay plans) |
|
Recommended reading
Preliminary reading could include:
Elizabeth Rawson, Intellectual life in the Late Roman Republic (1985)
N. Rosenstein, ‘Aristocratic values’ in The Oxford Companion to the Roman Republic ed. N. Rosenstein and R. Morstein-Marx (2011), 365-382.
J. P. V. D. Balsdon, Romans and Aliens (1979)
E. Gruen, Culture and National Identity in Republican Rome (1992)
D. Earl, The Moral and Political Tradition of Rome (1967)
A. Wardman, Rome’s Debt to Greece (1976)
Catherine Edwards, The Politics of Immorality in Ancient Rome (1993)
C. Wirszubski, Libertas as a Political Idea at Rome during the Late Republic and early Principate (1967, repr. 2007)
M. McDonnell, Roman Manliness: virtus and the Roman Republic (2006)
Harriet Flower, Ancestor Masks and Aristocratic Power in Roman Culture (1996)
Study hours
Scheduled activity hours | |
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Lectures | 22 |
Seminars | 11 |
Independent study hours | |
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Independent study | 167 |
Teaching staff
Staff member | Role |
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Mary Beagon | Unit coordinator |