The Language of the Past and the Future of Ancient Studies, The Center for Ancient Studies at the University of Pennsylvania 2015 Annual Symposium, University of Pennsylvania, Rainey Auditorium, October 16–17, 2015
This conference will explore the role of languages and language study in the field of ancient studies as a whole. Topics considered will include the relationships between ancient languages and cultures and the scholarly traditions that have grown up around them; between philological and other modes of interpretation (visual, material, religious, and so forth); and between ancient and modern studies as defined by bodies of evidence, hermeneutic traditions, and the cultural affinities of the interpreting subject; the various technologies of linguistic and philological scholarship; and the differential relationships that exist between specific ancient languages (and cultures) and their various modern analogues — Latin and Romance, Biblical and modern Hebrew, classical Arabic or Chinese and their contemporary derivatives, the languages of the Indian subcontinent and of the New World. An international group of speakers and respondents representing a wide variety of subject areas, disciplines will bring their expertise to bear on these questions.
Admission is free, but please register in advance at ancient@sas.upenn.edu.