Life & Letters Magazine

Department of Classics

Ask An Aqueduct

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You’ve seen them on TV and in movies, in History Channel specials and textbooks on antiquity, maybe even on a tour of the Italian countryside. But to archaeologist Rabun Taylor, there’s more to aqueducts than meets the eye.

A Classics Podcast Gets Greek Greats Onto Your Phone

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The idea for Deborah Beck’s podcast burst forth from her head like the goddess Athena from the head of Zeus. That moment of inspiration has turned into three seasons and counting of “Musings in Greek Literature,” a podcast on classical Greek texts hosted by Beck and a rotating cast of her advanced undergraduate students.

Antiquities Road Show Busts Its Way to UT

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In October of 2018, Austin-based antiques dealer Laura Young purchased a marble bust at Goodwill for $34.99. Suspecting that the sculpture might be a much greater find, Young reached out to The University of Texas at Austin professors Rabun Taylor (Classics), Stephennie Mulder (Art & Art History), and Penelope Davies (Art & Art History), to understand more about the piece. As it turns out, the artifact was indeed a find dating to ancient Rome, approximately the late first century B.C. or early first century A.D.

See the Unseen: Help our Vets Heal Through Art and Performance

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We miss a lot that is important in life because we are busy with our day-to-day concerns. When we do have leisure time, we choose mindless activities for good reasons. It does our souls good to vacate our minds.  Right after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 traumatized our nation, our president advised us: […]

Consider War Stories Without Romanticizing Them

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For as long as there have been wars — which in human history is forever — there have been stories about war. They stretch back to Homer’s riveting epic songs of the battlefield — the “Iliad” — and of returning home from it — the “Odyssey.” They come forward in truly sensitive films like Richard […]

Beyond the Battlefield: The war rages on, but this time it’s personal

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The Thorazine haze was beginning to fade when Glenn Towery was discharged from Oakland Naval Hospital. For the last however-many days he had felt listless, “like a non-human being,” making him forget why he was even there in the first place. Before that, he occupied a hospital cot in the Philippines, next to an injured […]

The “Unfreakingbelievable” World of College Football

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I have followed and written commentaries about big-time sports at UT Austin for some fifteen years. Between 2008 and 2011, I was UT and Big XII representative on the national Coalition on Intercollegiate Athletics. I was invited to lunch by former athletics director DeLoss Dodds, who knew and adeptly practiced the art of keeping your […]

Can We Talk?: Why Discourse is Dying in America

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I’ll have to admit that I was a bit perplexed when I heard linguistic anthropologist Elizabeth Keating say, “There is a very strong preference for agreement in conversation in the U.S.” I couldn’t believe my ears — even the Pew Research Center pegged political polarization as the defining feature of modern U.S. politics. And it’s […]

The Untold Stories of Modern Warriors

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The bravest are surely those who have the clearest vision of what is before them, glory and danger alike, and yet notwithstanding, go out to meet it.   – Thucydides  Oftentimes, we are met with spectacular images of war, depicting valiance and vilifying enemies; but these stories, some say, lack an honest narrative. While soldiers […]

Millennial Nation

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A Generational Look at Education, Money and Work Empathetic. Impatient. Innovative. Unfocused. Rational. Naive. Excited. These are the words millennials in the College of Liberal Arts use when they’re asked to describe themselves. However, it’s a question they’re not often asked. Plenty of people, from journalists to researchers to employers, are looking to define who […]

Adventures in Online Learning

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Exploring the Acronym Jungle of MOOCs, SMOCs and Beyond When Professors John Hoberman and Daniel Bonevac sat down with a small development team in January to create two new online courses, the possibilities of “what if” and “could we” electrified the room. The goal: to deliver 72 hours of traditional coursework in an engaging and interactive […]

The Gospels in Rewrite

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University of Texas at Austin Classics and Religious Studies Professor L. Michael White is equally at home reading ancient texts as he is directing the archaeological dig of the oldest known Jewish synagogue in Europe and teaching large undergraduate classes and graduate seminars. He brings teaching and research together in writing journal articles and books. […]

Got it in Writing

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A surprising Bronze Age discovery Listening to Cynthia Shelmerdine describe the writing on a Greek tablet from more than 3,000 years ago, it’s like she was looking over the scribe’s shoulder as he worked. She points out details and nuance of technique, the condition of the tablet and what it means, literally, and for the […]

Classics’ Detective Work Leads to the Return of Stolen Artifact

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Back in 2007, Gina Giovannone was contacted by the U.S. Border Patrol to help identify an old manuscript written in Latin  that was believed to have been stolen from a Jesuit library in Peru. Acting on a lead, a customs officer had identified a man arriving in Houston who had history of possession of stolen […]