Greek Culture
HUMANITIES INSTITUTE GREEK CULTURE Course Description Greek Culture explores the culture of ancient Greece, with an emphasis on art, economics, political science, social customs, community organization, religion, and philosophy. About the Professor This course was developed by Frederick Will, Ph.D., professor emeritus from the University of Iowa. © 2015 by Humanities Institute Course Contents Week 1 Introduction TEMPLES AND THEIR ART Week 2 The Greek Temple Week 3 Greek Sculpture Week 4 Greek Pottery THE GREEK STATE Week 5 The Polis Week 6 Participation in the Polis Week 7 Economy and Society in the Polis PRIVATE LIFE Week 8 At the Dinner Table Week 9 Sex and Marriage Week 10 Clothing CAREERS AND TRAINING Week 11 Farmers and Athletes Week 12 Paideia RELIGION Week 13 The Olympian Gods Week 14 Worship of the Gods Week 15 Religious Scepticism and Criticism OVERVIEW OF GREEK CULTURE Week 16 Overview of Greek Culture Selected collateral readings Week 1 Introduction Greek culture. There is Greek literature, which is the fine art of Greek culture in language. There is Greek history, which is the study of the development of the Greek political and social world through time. Squeezed in between them, marked by each of its neighbors, is Greek culture, an expression, and little more, to indicate ‘the way a people lived,’ their life- style. As you will see, in the following syllabus, the ‘manner of life’ can indeed include the ‘products of the finer arts’—literature, philosophy, by which a people orients itself in its larger meanings—and the ‘manner of life’ can also be understood in terms of the chronological history of a people; but on the whole, and for our purposes here, ‘manner of life’ will tend to mean the way a people builds a society, arranges its eating and drinking habits, builds its places of worship, dispenses its value and ownership codes in terms of an economy, and arranges the ceremonies of marriage burial and social initiation.
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