Introduction to the History of Greek (CLAS0078)

Teaching Delivery: This module is taught in 10 weekly lectures

Content: An introduction to the history of Ancient Greek, including an introduction to Greek historical phonology and morphology. The course will review the Indo-European origins of Greek; it will include an introduction to Mycenaean Greek, to the language of Homeric epic, and to the ancient Greek dialects. A range of epigraphic and literary texts will be studied: core topics will include the history of writing in the ancient Aegean and the graphic representation of Greek; the dialectal affiliations of Mycenaean and Homeric Greek; literary dialect and social registers of Greek; and the emergence of the koine in the late classical period.

Skills: At the end of the module students should:

1. Be able to give an account of the central linguistic issues in the history of the Greek language.

2. Understand how Classical Greek stands in relation to archaic Greek and the Greek dialects; and how it gave rise to the post-classical koine.

3. Be familiar with basic linguistic principles and understand how they inform our analysis of Greek of all periods, and of other languages.

4. Be in a position to demonstrate how Greek stands in relation to other Indo-European languages.

Texts: TBC

 

The final year dissertation is an opportunity to undertake an in-depth, empirical investigation of a social science topic of the students’ own choice. It...

The final year dissertation is an opportunity to undertake an in-depth, empirical investigation of a social science topic of the students’ own choice. It allows students to develop and apply research skills acquired during the BSc Social Sciences. Support workshops are designed to ‘scaffold’ the research process throughout the year on issues such as research design, ethics, literature review, data collection and analysis. Individual supervisory support will help students to develop their confidence in articulating their ideas and structuring their arguments. All students present a poster or oral presentation as part of an end of year celebration of their dissertation achievements.