A New Vocabulary for Ancient Blackness

Dr. Sarah Derbew (Harvard University) takes us on a quest to disentangle the role of blackness in ancient Greek literary culture as she reconceives the meaning of blackness and the place of black people in antiquity and its study. It uses the satiric writer Lucian’s dialogue “Anacharsis and Athletics” as a case study to probe deeply into the intersections of blackness, race and identity. Altogether, this interdisciplinary project looks back to Greek antiquity while maintaining a footing in our present word, a world in which skin color, race and identity are deeply intertwined.

This lecture is open to the public.