International Summer School

Once you have been offered a place on the programme, we will contact you and ask you to submit your top three research project choices. You may select projects from more than one humanities subject area (History, Archaeology, Scottish Studies, Classics, Information Studies, Philosophy, and Gender Studies). Your allocated research project will be confirmed in April.

1. The Depiction of the Classical World in 21st-century Media 
2. Ancient Sparta in Modern Political Thought 
3. Commemoration of Women in Ancient Rome 

1. The Depiction of the Classical World in 21st-century Media
Supervisor: Savinay Sood

There has been no shortage of interest in the classical world in twenty-first century media, from Madeline Miller’s books The Song of Achilles and Circe, to Ridley Scott’s film Gladiator, to Caesar’s Legion as featured in the postapocalyptic video game Fallout: New Vegas. Modern understandings of antiquity are largely filtered through popular culture.

This project invites students to critically examine perceptions and depictions of the classical past, and may explore questions of power, gender, race, and imperialism. Students will formulate a research focus with the support of their supervisor, to analyse engagement with the classical world in chosen media. Projects will investigate representations of antiquity and the contexts of their creation, and students may wish to connect case study examples to relevant ancient sources, including objects, images, or texts (in translation as required), to consider ways in which original material has been received and transformed.

Indicative preliminary reading

• Blanshard, A. and K. Shahabudin. 2011. Classics on Screen: Ancient Greece and Rome on Film (Bristol Classical Press)
• Hardwick, L. and C. Stray (eds). 2008. A Companion to Classical Receptions (Blackwell)
• Lowe, D. and K. Shahabudin (eds). 2009. Classics For All: Reworking Antiquity in Mass Culture (Cambridge Scholars Publishing)
• Machado, D. 2020. ‘Battle Narratives from Ancient Historiography to Total War: Rome II’, in Classical Antiquity in Video Games: Playing with the Ancient World, ed. by C. Rollinger (Bloomsbury), pp. 93-106
• Richardson, E. 2019. Classics in Extremis: The Edges of Classical Reception (Bloomsbury)

Further case studies could include

• Ford-Coppola, F. 2024. Megalopolis (Lionsgate)
• Supergiant Games. 2020. Hades

2. Ancient Sparta in Modern Political Thought
Supervisor: Aaron Pocock

The ancient Spartans have an enduring legacy in modern political thinking, in areas such as exploration of human liberty; conceptions of ancient connections and racial purity; and ideas about gender roles and social structure. From the T4 program in Nazi Germany to analogies drawn with the Soviet Union to twenty-first century American politics, Sparta has continued to hold prominence as offering a socio-political framework that may be emulated.

Working with their supervisor, students are invited to develop a project investigating the representation of ancient Sparta in modern political discourse. Case studies may examine diverse geographical contexts from the nineteenth-century to the present day. Projects may consider interpretation of an aspect of Spartan society such as gender, slavery, government, militarism and foreign policy in the Persian and Peloponnesian Wars. Students may examine classical evidence of Sparta (using translated sources) to analyse how ancient material has been received, understood, and perhaps manipulated, and its influence across the modern world.

Indicative Preliminary Reading

• Hodkinson, S. et. al. 2012. Sparta in Modern Thought: Politics, History and Culture (Classical Press of Wales)
• Rawson, E. 1991. The Spartan Tradition in European Thought (Oxford University Press)
• Cartledge, P. 2001. Spartan Reflections (Duckworth)
• Halkos, G.E. et al. 2022. ‘Tracing the Optimal Level of Political and Social Change under Risks and Uncertainties: Some Lessons from Ancient Sparta and Athens’, Journal of Risk and Financial Management, 15.9, p. 416.
• Kelly, D.H. 1972. Sparta: Some Myths Ancient and Modern, Ancient History Resources for Teachers, 2.1, p. 3
• Cartledge, P. 2006. ‘Spartan Traditions and Receptions’, Hermathena, 181, pp. 41-49
• Bremmer, J.N. 1997. Myth as Propaganda: Athens and Sparta, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, pp. 9-17

Classical Primary Sources

• Plutarch, Xenophon and Talbert, R.J.A. 1988, Plutarch on Sparta (Penguin)
• Herodotus, Waterfield, R. 1998. Herodotus: the Histories (Oxford University Press)

3. Commemoration of Women in Ancient Rome
Supervisor: Kris Wong

The Late Republican and Early Imperial periods saw Roman culture undergo rapid change, including in roles played by elite women. This project investigates how lives of such women were remembered in ancient Rome. Working with their supervisor, and using translated materials as required, students are invited to consider material, religious, and historical commemorations, and the creation and re-interpretation of cultural narratives surrounding women. Projects may wish to explore the impact of commemorations on Roman cultural memory, engaging with new developments in the field of memory culture and examining memory as a social phenomenon.

Students may investigate case studies such as the so-called Laudatio Turiae funerary inscription – a uniquely multifaceted, extensive example of physical memorialisation dedicated to an elite woman’s life and her part in the Civil War; the contested commemoration (and eventual divinisation) of the Empress Livia Drusilla; and the Augustan reception of Cornelia (mother of the Gracchi) as an exemplary Roman matrona.

Indicative preliminary reading

• Daveloose, A. 2023. ‘A Roman Matron as Figure of Memory: Social Memory and Cornelia, Mother of the Gracchi’, Historia: Zeitschrift für alte Geschichte, 72.4, pp. 444-468.
• Hemelrijk, E. A. 2004. ‘Masculinity and Femininity in the “Laudatio Turiae”’, The Classical Quarterly, 54.1, pp. 185–197.
• Kleiner, F.S. 1990. ‘An Extraordinary Posthumous Honor for Livia’, Athenaeum, 78, pp. 508-514
• Roller, M.B. 2018. ‘Cornelia: An Exemplary matrona among the Gracchi’, in Models from the Past in Roman Culture: A World of Exempla, ed. by M.B Roller (Cambridge University Press), pp. 197–232.

Primary sources

• Osgood, J. 2014. Turia: A Roman Woman’s Civil War (Oxford University Press)
• Suetonius. 1914. Lives of the Caesars, Volume II: Claudius. Nero. Galba, Otho, and Vitellius. Vespasian. Titus, Domitian. Lives of Illustrious Men: Grammarians and Rhetoricians. Poets (Terence. Virgil. Horace. Tibullus. Persius. Lucan). Lives of Pliny the Elder and Passienus Crispus. Trans. by J. C. Rolfe (Harvard University Press).

This course aims to:

• Provide an opportunity to undertake an independent research project in the Humanities under supervision.
• Introduce approaches to research and analysis in the Humanities
• Develop professional skills in research and analysis and transferable skills in oral and written argument.

 By the end of this course you will be able to:

• Assess scholarly literature and available sources to formulate a viable research question in the Humanities
• Contextualise and critically analyse sources to produce a convincing argument
• Express analysis and argument in written and oral forms

Weekly seminars specific to humanities (these may include group visits to the Glasgow University and Hunterian collections, as well as the course conference) and twice weekly supervisor meetings.

• GPA of 3.0 (or equivalent)
• you should be currently enrolled at an international higher education institution.
• two years of study in university-level Humanities courses with a major or minor in a relevant subject (Applicants who have only attended university for one year will be considered if strong performance in a relevant Humanities subject can be demonstrated).

If your first language is not English, you must meet our minimum proficiency level:

• International English Language Testing System (IELTS) Academic module (not General Training) overall score of 6.0, with no sub test less than 5.5
• we also accept equivalent scores in other recognised qualifications such as ibTOEFL, CAE, CPE and more.

This is a guide, for further information email internationalsummerschools@gla.systa-s.com