Humanities

Dress for Success

Sandy Bonds is making the past come alive with a course called “Reinventing Yourself: Creating Your Past Alter Ego.”

Arabic Tops 200

Enrollment in Arabic language classes topped 200 students last year, and is expected to surge past that figure this fall.

Talking Trash

William Shakespeare was the ultimate trash-talker of his era, with treasured bon mots such as “Thou crusty botch of nature!” But the Bard may have taken a cue from some of his predecessors, as evidenced by the catalog of insults on the Medieval Studies web site.

Food of the Gods

The syllabus for professor Mary Jaeger’s Greco-Roman class reads a little like an ancient shopping list. She requests that students provide certain supplies: a bowl, spoon, knife and a few basic ingredients including fl our, water and salt. Students should be ready to learn about milk and honey one day and the Mediterranean triad of cereals, olives and wine the next.

The Healing Art of Fiction

Dorothee Ostmeier was never simply a traditional German professor. Her research interests have regularly expanded to include poetry and gender, fairy tales, fantasy literature and psychology. Since coming to the UO in 2001, she’s further expanded her research into alternative philosophies of healing.

All Saints Day(s)

So many saints, so little time to figure out who’s who. Linguistics professor Cynthia Vakareliyska has spent the past year developing an online database of medieval calendars of saints from the Eastern Orthodox Church.  (Right: A page from a medieval calendar of saints.)

Judaic Studies Scholar Named Associate Dean of Humanities