Visiting an Italian museum a few years ago, Laura Roncone found herself gazing at a statue of the gods Apollo and Daphne. The statue shows “Apollo trying to ‘take’ or abduct Daphne and, as the myth goes, Daphne is turning into a tree to defend herself” Laura explains. “This sculpture is so beautiful, and you kind of forget what it’s actually depicting.” As it turned out, her paradoxical experience of the ancient artwork became a catalyst for the Master’s thesis she is now researching. As a member of the first cohort in the Waterloo-Laurier joint MA program in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures, Laura is exploring art depictions of women in abduction contexts and how such representations affected the perception of female sexuality in ancient Rome. Such beautiful renderings of rape, Laura points out, begs questions about “what the viewer is supposed to think, and especially, what women of the time were supposed to think.”

Having earned her BA in Classical Studies at Waterloo, Laura explains that staying for the new MA program was “an obvious choice - you can't ask for professors more invested in their students' success.” While the program is jointly offered with Wilfrid Laurier University, students register at the university where faculty research interests best match their own. In UW’s Department of Classical Studies, the research concentration is primarily in ancient literatures, cultural and material history. “Classics offers something for everyone” Laura observes, “it’s a very integrated discipline, drawing on language, history, art, philosophy, law and more.”

“My thesis research is somewhat unusual in the Roman context” she continues, “while there’s lots of information about rape and abduction as it relates to ancient Greek culture, there has been less about Roman art.” One of Laura’s steps in planning her research approach has been to determine the best terminology for discussing her ancient topic from a 21st century perspective. After all, sexual crime is a more contemporary-western concept. “I found that words we use, such as ‘rape’, have different meanings today than they would have had in ancient Rome” she explains. “I’m using the term abduction rather than rape because the artwork typically shows just the abduction, while rape, in our modern sense of the word, is implied to inevitably take place.”

Understanding historical linguistic nuance is certainly important in ancient studies, and for this reason the Ancient Mediterranean Cultures MA program requires students to pass an ancient language exam and at least one modern language exam. For these degree requirements, Laura is studying Latin and has already passed exams in both French and Italian.

Basing her research on sculpture, wall painting, relief and mosaic, Laura is fortunate to have thesis supervision from Dr Craig Hardiman, who specializes in ancient material culture, particularly Greek and Roman art. While she has gathered a "nice library" of research support material, Laura points out that observing and analyzing the artwork itself interests her most. In fact, she describes much of the art as self-contained narrative works: “One large painting would tell a full story, showing a series of scenes with the same characters at different points.”

In its inaugural year, the MA program in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures is small with three students based at UW and another three at Laurier. As with many new graduate programs, enrolment numbers steadily increase as the program gains recognition. But Laura and her classmates have benefitted from being part of a brand-new grad program: “it’s very intimate and we get a lot of special attention, which is good.” Of the two core courses one is taught at Laurier, the other at Waterloo. As well, several courses are team taught by professors from both campuses (“it’s a nice way to get to know each other.”). Moreover, an extra bonus for this close-knit graduate group was arranged by Dr David Porreca (Classical Studies’ Associate Chair for the MA program) when he invited Dr Thomas Homer-Dixon to make several classroom visits. Homer-Dixon is a renowned multidisciplinary scholar, now based at the University of Waterloo, and an award-winning author of The Upside of Down, which addresses global systems in crisis and begins with a detailed look at the fall of the Roman Empire.

 April 2009
Wendy Philpott