Event Description
Join the Paideia Institute for the first installment of A Conversation on the Future of the Classics, a two-part lecture series on the future of the Classics as a field of academic study and as a Western cultural paradigm. As technology and politics reshape our world in real time, how should we approach the study of antiquity to make sense of the remote past, and the turbulent present? Is it time to deconstruct the culturally segmented study of history in favor of a more catholic humanistic method, or should the cultural legacy of the Greco-Roman world continue to occupy an exceptional status in our academic institutions and civic identity?
In his new book, What is Ancient History? (Pricenton University Press, 2025), Walter Scheidel argues for reuniting the study of antiquity as a global, transformative era in human development–rather than a fragmented, Greco-Roman centered discipline–in order to better understand the shared foundations of our world. Scheidel will discuss the central ideas put forth in his book in dialogue with James Hankins, whose recent book, The Golden Thread: A History of the Western Tradition (Encounter Books, 2025) offers a differing methodology for the study of Western history.
Hankins will, in turn, give a lecture on Thursday, October 2nd at 7:00pm ET in dialogue with Scheidel in a similar format.
Abstract
Walter Scheidel calls for a new approach to the study of ancient history that captures antiquity’s pivotal role as a decisive phase in human development, one that provided the shared foundation of our world and continues to shape our lives today. Ancient history was when the earliest versions of today’s ways of life were created and spread—from farming, mining, and engineering to housing and transportation, cities and government, writing and belief systems. Transforming the planet, this process unfolded all over the world, in Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas, often at different times, sometimes haltingly but ultimately unstoppably. Yet it is rarely studied or taught that way. Western intellectuals have long dismembered the ancient world, driven not only by their quest for professional expertise but also by nationalism, colonialism, racism, and the idealization of Greece and Rome. This fracturing obscures broader patterns and dynamics and keeps us from understanding just how much humanity has long had in common. The time has come to put the ancient world back together—even if that may require us to bid farewell to Greco-Roman Classics as a separate academic discipline.
Event Info
Sep 28, 2025 at 01:00 PM - 02:00 PM EDT
Online
Guest Speaker
