The Endless Knot
We discuss etymology, history, literature, science, and language, and the connections between them.
We spoke with Dr. Anne Curzan about her new book, “Says Who? A Kinder, Funner Usage Guide for Everyone Who Cares about Words”. We talk about language change, inner grammandos, the benefits of learning the rules of texting from one’s students, and of course, surprising connections!
Also, please check out the Defeat Depression fundraising event, and the Sudbury Walk/Run on May 25.
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Buried deep under volcanic ash lie hundreds of burnt scrolls containing texts from the first century. A new project is driving the work to try to read these chunks of carbon, to uncover new works and open new doors into the past. We spoke to one of the leaders of this project, Dr. Stephen Parsons, about the Vesuvius Challenge, the technical aspects of ‘virtual unrolling’, the possibilities of new classical texts, the development of new ways of doing scholarship, and more.
Also, please check out the Defeat Depression fundraising event, and the Sudbury Walk/Run on May 25.
This podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License
We talked to Dr. Karen Carr about the global history of swimming — in myth, folktale, and history. Who swam, who didn’t, and how do the stories different cultures told reflect these patterns? We also talked a bit about Dr. Carr’s next book, all about silver, women, and textiles.
Dr. Carr’s history website and blog, Quatr.us
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It’s time for us to talk about plagues — ancient, medieval, literary, etymological, and psychological! We’re joined by Moxie from Your Brain on Facts for a very fun — if slightly disturbing — discussion of many aspects of historical plagues.
Gardner, H.H. Pestilence and the Body Politic in Latin Literature. 2019.
Episode 44: "Us" & "Them" in the Ancient & Anglo-Saxon Worlds
Episode 51: Race & Racism in Ancient & Medieval Studies, Part One: The Problem
Episode 52: Race & Racism in Ancient & Medieval Studies, Part Two: Responses
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This bonus episode contains two talks we gave at our university in November. Mark spoke about “The ‘Anglo-Saxon’ Problem: Language and Racism in Medieval Studies” and Aven spoke about “Defining ‘Race’ in the Ancient Mediterranean and Today”.
Google ngrams for collocations of “Anglo-Saxon”:
“Whitewashing Ancient Statues: Whiteness, Racism And Color In The Ancient World”, by Sarah Bond
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