Meggie Macdonald

The Chicago Flame, a publication devoted to reporting on the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC),  published an article last year regarding the transitional period underway in the Classics Department at the time.  Head of the department John Ramsay detailed that, in response to falling enrollment numbers in Latin and Greek courses, the university had requested that the department find a way to amalgamate the three majors – Latin, Greek, and Classical Studies – into one.  The hope was that, even with a single major, it could be flexible enough to accomodate students wishing to focus on languages, literature, archaeology, history etc.

This is an issue facing many undergraduate level classical studies programs throughout Canada and the United States:  how to encourage enrollment, how to maintain the high level of academic tuition, how to keep classics in the curriculum.  In very few cases, attempts have failed and the department of classics has either been absorbed into a larger unit, such as History or Near Eastern Studies or Religion, or done away with entirely apart from a few vagrant courses.

From reviewing the UIC Department of Classics website recently, I have noted that an alternative solution to the single major was developed and, thus far, seems to be doing well.  There are now two majors for UIC Classics students:  Classical Languages and Literature and Classical Studies.  In fact, it appears that the original three majors have been simplified:  Latin and Greek are included under a single umbrella major with a specialization in either or of the ancient languages.  A student no longer has to choose one or the other, languages or history, but can incorporate the two to establish their own academic specialization while still meeting the university requirements in the Faculty of Liberal Arts.

The solution from UIC’s Department of Classics is just one of a variety of options available to other departments and faculties facing tough times.  I for one am relieved to see that Classics at UIC was not absorbed and disbursed throughout the larger faculty and that it is still on the radar for students wishing to study the ancient world.  The creativity of academics is rarely so self-evident as in situations where their very survival depends on their ability to be flexible, sensible, and demanding simultaneously.

There’s hope for the fossilized bookish types yet!

Memorial University in Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada has developed a new social networking site, specifically for academics and academic research. Called a “research matchmaker” by reporter Elizabeth Church, yaffle.ca was created in response to larger ratios of government funding for universities, a sort of quantitative result-based initiative for a discipline that is rarely defined in such objective terms.

The project has been met with praise across the country.  York University President Mamdouh Shoukri states that a competitive society needs to use its knowledge.  Project head David Yetman reports:  “Persuading faculty to look beyond the lecture hall and the library is not always straightforward.  Academic success – and tenure – is based primarly on published research, not public works, making participation in such projects entirely voluntary”.  Mr. Yetman calls Yaffle the Google of university research, something that allows researchers, students, and professors to connect, share, trade, and unite their research into work that is mutually beneficial.

Hopefully this project will catch on at other universities – currently it is only linked to Memorial University projects – so that the globalization of knowledge can be developed and augmented.

The recent re-discovery of a cuneiform tablet from the Middle East, originally found by Londoner Leonard Simmons during his service with the RAF between 1945 and 1948, has experts at the British Museum all atwitter.  The tablet was inherited by Mr. Simmons’ son, Douglas, who brought it to a British Museum Open Day and introduced it to Irving Finkel.  Mr. Finkel – an expert in cuneiform script on clay tablets – realised what a find the tablet was when he translated the text and saw that it represented an entirely new version of the story of Noah’s Ark.

According to Mr.Finkel, Mr. Simmons’ tablet is the first on record to describe the shape of the vessel:  round, circular, and made from reeds.  The ark did not have to be an ocean-going vessel with a prow and keel; it merely had to float as the flood waters rose.  Vessels of similar design are still used in Iraq and Iran to float livestock during river floods.

The original article from The Globe and Mail weekend edition of 2 January 2010 by Guardian Press Service reporter Maev Kennedy has proved rather difficult to find again.  However, Ms. Kennedy’s article suggests that further questions remain to be answered.  In particular, whether a replica of the ark recently opened to the public in Hong Kong will be considered inaccurate so soon after its unveiling.

In addition, I recently read a verse translation of the Epic of Gilgamesh by Hugh Mason that includes several new tablets that previously had been omitted for editorial reasons.  In the story, Gilgamesh meets Utnapishtim, who drank from the Fountain of Immortality after surviving a flood sent by the gods.  Unerringly similar to the Biblical Noah, Utnapishtim unites the Mesopotamian and Hebrew traditions and suggests, at the very least, a common cultural association between an ancient flood and the reverence due to the survivors.