THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 21
Old Mission Santa Barbara, and the Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library
Registration/Sign In 3:15-3:30 PM (doors open at 3 PM)
Welcome Remarks 3:30-3:45 PM
Elizabeth DePalma Digeser
Department of History, UC Santa Barbara
Jack Clark Robinson
OFM, Executive Director, Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library
Mónica Orozco
Executive Director, Old Mission Santa Barbara
Keynote Address I (Bonaventure Hall) 3:45-4:45 PM
Andrew Laird
John Rowe Workman Distinguished Professor of Classics and
Humanities, Brown University
“The City of God in Mexico”
Introduced by Elizabeth Digeser
Reception (Santa Bárbara Mission Gallery) 5:00-6:00 PM
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22
Crowell and McCune Rooms
6028 and 6020 Humanities and Social Science Building, UC Santa Barbara
Continental Breakfast (Registration materials also available) 8:00 AM
Welcome Remarks 8:30 AM
Kathleen M. Moore
Associate Dean of the Humanities & Fine Arts, UC Santa Barbara
Session One: Roman & Post-Roman Africa 8:40-10:30 AM
Chair: David J. DeVore
Department of History, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona
Elizabeth Buchanan (University of Findlay)
“The Long (and perhaps not so Dead) Arm of Imperial Roman Law in European and Mediterranean Late Antiquity”
John Ladouceur (Princeton University)
“Monumental Exegesis: Mediterranean Scriptural Culture in Aksumite Military Inscriptions”
Tommaso Giuliodoro (Durham University)
“Mauri and Romans in Late Antique North Africa: Beyond the Sixth Century”
Eric Fournier (West Chester University)
“From the Maccabees to Cyprian, to the Passion of the Seven Martyrs: Intertextuality in Vandal Martyrological Literature”
Coffee Break 10:30-10:50 AM
Session Two: Trade Routes & Culture Contact 10:50-12:40 AM
Chair: Claudia Moser
Department of the History of Art & Architecture, UCSB
Walter Ward (University of Alabama at Birmingham)
“Roman Red Sea Ports and Cultural Contact in Late Antiquity”
Ralph Mathisen (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
“‘All the Glitters is not Gold’: The New Silver Economy beyond Rome’s Northern Frontier”
Valentina Grasso (Bard College)
“Romans, quō vādis?: Trading Networks in Other Late Antique Mediterranean Seas”
Claudia Tavolieri (Tor Vergata University of Rome)
“Trade Routes in the Syriac Sources from the 5th to the 7th Centuries. The Importance of the Acts of the Nestorian Synods”
Workshop I: Teaching Global Antiquity–A Conversation over Lunch 1:00-2:30 PM
Chair: Elizabeth Digeser
Peninah Wolpo (University of New Mexico–Los Alamos)
“Eliciting Rome: Enriching the Student Experience in Classics Courses within a General Education Program”
Tim William Watson (California State University, Northridge)
“Electra from Athens to L.A.: Luis Alfaro’s Electricidad in the HSI Classroom”
Laurent Cases (National Taiwan University) &
Elizaveta Litovskaia (National Taiwan University)
“Actualizing Ancient Literature: Social Media and Overcoming the Challenges of Teaching Classics in 21st Century Taiwan”
Refreshment Break 2:30-2:50 PM
Session Three: Roman Matter(s) in Motion 2:50-4:40 PM
Chair: Natalie Cobo
Faculty of History, University of Oxford
Diliana Angelova (University of California, Berkeley)
“Devotional Uses of Late Roman Coins in India”
Emily Everest-Philips (New York University)
“Echoes of Entanglement: Roman Afterlives in Medieval Central Asia”
Noel Lenski (Yale University)
“Persecuting Jews to Save the Enslaved: A Constantinian Law and its Afterlife in Medieval Spain and Spanish Colonial America”
Jennifer Barry (University of Mary Washington)
“Red Shoes: Representations of the Virgin on the Walls of Kariye Camii”
Refreshment Break 4:40-5:00 PM
Keynote Address II 5:00 PM
Ashley Coutu
Research Curator and Deputy Head of Research, Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
“Zooming in on Ivory: How Scientific Methods are Shaping our Understanding of Global Late Antiquity”
Introduced by Susanna Elm, Department of History, UC Berkeley
Banquet (badge required) 6:00 PM
The Club at UC Santa Barbara
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 23
Morning only: Crowell and McCune Rooms, Humanities & Social Sciences Building, UC Santa Barbara
Afternoon: Old Mission Santa Barbara and the Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library
Continental Breakfast 8:00 AM
Keynote Address III 8:30 AM
Jack Tannous
Princeton University
“‘Rome’ and ‘Romans’ viewed from the East”
Introduced by Michele Renee Salzman, Department of History, UC Riverside
Session Four: Rome and Persia 9:30-11:20 AM
Chair: John W. I. Lee
Department of History, UC Santa Barbara
Christine Shepardson (The University of Tennessee, Knoxville)
“Doctrines without Borders: John of Tella between Rome and Persia”
Laura Estes (Pepperdine University)
“Ephrem’s Hymns Against Julian: Constructing “Roman” and “Pagan” on the Roman-Persian Border”
Byron Waldron (University of Sydney)
“Investigations towards a non-Roman History of Rome and Persia”
Ekaterina Nechaeva (University of Lille)
“Swapping Prisoners of War and Defectors: International ‘Matchmaking’ in Late Antique Rome and Iran”
Lunch Break 11:20-11:50 AM
Session Five: Rome and Islam 11:50-1:40 PM
Chair: Rose MacLean
Department of Classics, UC Santa Barbara
Jody Michael Gordon (Wentworth Institute of Technology) & Young Richard Kim (University of Illinois Chicago)
“Déluge or Détente? Becoming (Late) Roman in Seventh-Century Cyprus”
Omri Matarasso (Princeton University)
“Remembering Rome and Sasanian Iran in Northern Mesopotamian Monasteries under Early Islam”
Matthew Crum (University of California, San Diego)
“Roman Sicily through the Eyes of the Arabs”
Paul Ulishney (University of Oxford)
“An Eastern Roman in the Umayyad Caliphate: Anastasius of Sinai and Roman Identity in Marwānid Egypt”
Travel to Old Mission Santa Barbara 1:40-2:00 PM
Tours of the Mission Archive Library and and self-guided tour at the Mission (badge required) 2:00-4:00 PM
Fr. Jack Clark Robinson (Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library)
Workshop II: Thinking Out Loud: Re-constructing “Classics” in a California Context 4:00-5:00 PM
Round Table: Susanna Elm (UC Berkeley), Michele Salzman (UC Riverside), Beth Digeser (UC Santa Barbara); Duncan MacRae (UC Berkeley)
Santa Bárbara Mission Archive-Library, Mission Gallery
Moderated by Ryan Abrecht, Department of History, University of San Diego
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 24
Crowell and McCune Rooms
6028 and 6020 Humanities and Social Science Building, UC Santa Barbara
Continental Breakfast (Registration materials also available) 8:00 AM
Session Six: Later Receptions 8:30-10:20 AM
Chair: Heidi Marx
Department of Religion, University of Manitoba
Madeleine St. Marie (Community College of Denver)
“‘Pandemic: Fall of Rome:’ Romanness, Corruption, and the Popular Imaginary”
Jeremy Swist (Miami University)
“From Argentoratum to Argentina: Heavy Metal, Decolonialism, and the World’s First Concept Album on the Emperor Julian”
Hope Willard (University of Lincoln)
“Herman Melville and the Barbarians”
Amanda Luyster (College of the Holy Cross)
“King Arthur as a Roman Emperor? Roman and Byzantine Imperial Traditions in Medieval English Visual Culture”
Coffee Break 10:20-10:40 AM
Session Seven: Oppositional Forces 10:40-12:30 AM
Chair: Jeremiah Coogan
Jesuit School of Theology, Santa Clara University
David J. DeVore (California State Polytechnic University, Pomona)
“Pretentious Greeks, Distant Romans: Oppositional Identities in the Roman Levant, ca. 100-350 CE”
Yuliya Minets (The University of Alabama)
“People with Accents: Romans and Others in Global Late Antiquity”
Craig Caldwell (Appalachian State University)
“‘Send Them to Thrace’: Forced Immigration from Armenia to the Balkans”
Dana Juliana Viezure (Georgia Institute of Technology)
“Roman Asylum ad statuas in Ostrogothic Italy: A Pope’s Verdict”
Conference Lunch & Meeting of the Society for Late Antiquity 12:30 PM