John H. Starks, Jr.
Teaching Portfolio of Syllabi, Teaching Materials, and Teaching Evaluations
Courses in A) Civilization B) Drama C) Greek and Latin
A) Courses in Ancient Culture,
Civilization, History |
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Rhetoric/Persuasion (15-25 students, speaking intensive) This was the only 100-level course offered in our department at UNCG, and it served as a reasoning and discourse alternative to the speaking component of freshman composition. Roughly 1/3 of the class is devoted to instruction in the fundamental rules of classical rhetoric, 1/3 on classical speeches and 1/3 on modern speeches of the judicial, deliberative and demonstrative types. Students deliver one speech of each type, and gradually wean themselves away from group work that helps them learn to build their skills in persuasive argument and complex speech analysis. During the 2004 election, the presidential debates provided a practical module for rhetorical analysis of delivery and content based on classical theory. LAST TAUGHT 2004 |
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Classical Biography: (freshman
seminar in history, writing intensive - 20 students; general education
Classical Civilization – 50 students) When I was invited in 2002 to construct
a new Freshman Seminar, I was the first member of the UNCG Classical Studies
Department to develop a class using classical biography, my graduate school
special field. Students worked on multiple group projects and delivered final
presentations on biographies that we had not read during the term. Class was
operated seminar style with many variations on group discussion.Significant attention to numismatics,
portrait sculpture, and rhetorical and ethical constructions for
investigating lives informed and enlivened most discussions. This has also
proven to be a successful course for introducing larger numbers of students
to Greek and Roman culture. LAST TAUGHT 2007
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Race and Ethnicity in Ancient North
Africa: (freshman seminar and
senior honors seminar in Sociology/Anthropology - 22 students; Oral intensive
global non-western course in Africana Studies, Anthropology, and Middle
Eastern and North African for 26 students) This is one of my two favorite
original courses, and was one of only two non-Western courses taught in our
department and cross-listed for application to the African Studies major. I
developed this course based on my own interest in Carthage and a sense that
more minority students in the diverse student body of UNCG would be drawn to
classics through interest in studying African cultures of the ancient world.
The freshman seminar created an amazing ethnic self-journey for several of my
African-American, European-American, and Jewish students with very informed
discussion about racial prejudice and pride and ethnic family traditions.
These freshmen were challenged to understand ancient Africa through the
lenses of Egyptians, Greeks and Romans before they knew much about the
classical world itself. The honors seminar, in turn, enlightened advanced
students to papyri, texts, and art that they had studied nowhere else in
their college curriculum. The ethnicity self-evaluation, Carthaginian debate,
oral reports, and final oral presentation on a modern ethnic conflict have
all proven to be excellent assignments for achieving the greater goal of
expanding cultural awareness and appreciation of African history and
non-western cultures through the classics. My original proposal was to study
four major ethnic groups that impacted the Greek and Roman worlds: Persia,
Egypt, Carthage, Gaul, an idea I would like to return to one day. This course
worked very well as a general education course at drawing new majors to
classics when I taught it at Binghamton University. LAST TAUGHT 2010
Honors Sample Preview Class of Race and Ethnicity in Ancient North Africa |
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Graffiti, Loose Change, Pots, and Scrap
Paper: Inscriptions, Coins, Ceramics and Papyri as Tools for Ancient History (Seminar 10-15) An introduction to the nature of
evidence and fields of historical investigation accessible through learning
basic Greek and Roman epigraphy, numismatics, ceramics and papyri. I
developed this course to introduce students to the fields of study that have
most inspired my own historical research in theater history. |
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Mythology: (1, 2, and 3-day per week lecture up to 150
students - including evening college; 2-day per week Honors/Residential
College with discussion-size classes; Lecture + Discussion sections format;
Summer School daily sessions) I have taught this course in chronological
literary and mythological order, always changing some readings, works of
ancient and modern art, and musical and cinematic adaptations each semester.
Most often, I have taught this class to 75-125 students, and with four
classes per semester most times that I taught it, I did not have the liberty
of assigning or grading writing assignments or essays the way I would like -
when I taught this as the lecturer at UNC Chapel Hill, I was able to assess
writing skills. In my honors sections I have included advanced interpretive
works and more oral projects and scholarly essays for students. LAST TAUGHT
2005 |
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Three Ancient Cities (20-25
students) Introductory
course for archaeological methodology and analysis, which principally
considers how the topography, architecture, and infrastructures of these three
cities flowed from and contributed to the social, political, economic, and
cultural flux of their populations over time. Emphasis on how cities
influence and are influenced by intricate ceremonies and simple daily tasks,
by involved planning and simple convenience, by personal choice and civic
good alike. Through significant attention to archaeological reading and
viewing, extensive work with maps and reconstructions, class discussion and
presentations, and web design, students learn several basic tools for
understanding how ancient cities and modern cities function, and a new
appreciation for their roles as citizens of their local, national and world
communities.
LAST TAUGHT 2006 Classics 144:
Three Ancient Cities: Athens, Rome, Alexandria |
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B) Courses in Drama |
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Comparative Drama: (2
day per week lecture/discussion format for up to 50 students) This course had
not been taught at UNCG since the mid-1970s when I resurrected it in 2001. I
ensured that it would be a comparative survey of theater in many cultures,
and especially insisted on introducing a non-western anthology along with a
great variety of African-American, women, and ethnic playwrights. Also, since
it is my experience that comedy often gets neglected in drama survey courses,
I have tried to emphasize comedy as satire in every period and culture we
study, from Aristophanes and Moliere to Tom Stoppard and Caryl
Churchill. Script analysis through gender, queer, ethnic, postmodern, and
traditional and new historical theory are blended into discussions. The other
mission of this course has been to get students who have not thought about, read , or watched live drama to discuss such a variety of
plays from many cultures that they can watch two live productions during the
term and analyze the drama critically, based on the foundations taught in the
course. Students write a character analysis and a review to show their
improvement in assessment of drama as both theater and literature. LAST
TAUGHT 2004 |
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Tragedy: (I asked to expand the enrollment from 25 to 40,
then to 75 for this popular upper-level course. I taught it in a 1-,2-, and 3-day format, including evening college) As with
all my drama courses, I concentrate on literary and dramatic script analysis
to allow students to feel the full impact of dramatic literature. to facilitate students' appreciation of artistic
developments in ancient tragedy, we read Aeschylus' Oresteia, Sophocles' Electra and Euripides' Electra and Orestes as the core of the course to provide a framework
on which to understand the authors' particular dramatic and conceptual
artistry. We spend considerable time interpreting the plays as live theater
(both by ancient and modern practice), and I have added a considerable amount
of ancient theater history to this course by using Csapo
and Slater's Context of Ancient Drama.
I also insist on addressing Hellenistic and Roman tragedy by reading
fragments from the Jewish playwright Ezekiel and early Roman tragedians, and
on making Seneca's tragedies more approachable by reading Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus. I show modern
adaptations in drama, dance, and opera when possible. LAST TAUGHT 2003 |
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Comedy: (15-25 student- only twice preselected for performance experience, Honors/Residential College, Fine Arts for Performance Content, Speaking/Writing Intensive) Directed musical productions of Aristophanes Femme Phantasmagoria (Thesmophoriazousai) (2009-Binghamton U, 2004-UNCGreensboro & CAMWS-Southern Section), Women Rule (Ekklesiazousai) (2001,2003), Wasps (1999, 2000), Lysistrata (1997, 1998); Something Old, Something New: A New Comedy Revue (Honors student-developed scripts of selected scenes from six comedies of Menander, Plautus and Terence - presented one group at North Carolina Classical Association) (2002). I have increasingly focused on the live production and improving production value, while remaining committed to the course as educational experiential theater. I have also assigned blocking and directing exercises, analysis of modern literary and oral/aural comedy for technique, analysis of personal sense of humor, oral final examination, and dramatic script analysis. I have also taught this course successfully twice without a major production, but I believe that the full theater experience for non-theater majors (and for theater tech majors who did not get to act at UNCG) was an invaluable college experience for many students. One classics major noted that he 'came out of his shell' socially and in his oral delivery skills from the acting exercises and production.
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Women in Greek and Roman Theater, Blegen Fellow Seminar, Vassar College 2011: highlights – collaboration with
Steve Rooks, dance chair and former principal dancer with Martha Graham Dance
Company on interpretations of Graham’s Clytemnestra and Cave
of the Heart.
Applications of song and film from Funny Thing Happened… to accent instruction on Plautus’ Casina. Papers and article presentations
by each of the 14 students. Women in Greek
and Roman Theater syllabus Women in Classical Drama: (Speaking Intensive, Honors for Majors, 12-22 students) - This course was developed from a student's suggestion after taking my tragedy course. Speaking intensive elements of this class included an oral presentation of a modern scholarly article selected by the student, two group performances, and an oral final examination on specific plays from each of the three major periods (classical Greece, Hellenistic/New Comedy Greece and Rome, Imperial Rome) in which we examined female presentation onstage. This course became a classics seminar, since every student was a classics major or minor and had strong grounding in classical literatures and cultures. This allowed us time to discuss deeper studies of the dramatic presentation of the feminine in the work of Froma Zeitlin and Helene Foley. I have also developed but not yet taught a short-term seminar derived from this course entitled Funny Girl: Women in Classical Comedy. |
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C) Courses in Greek and Latin |
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Elementary Greek (Athenaze):
Greek 101 –
LAST TAUGHT 2008 Greek 102 –
LAST TAUGHT 2009 Intermediate and Advanced Greek: I have been fortunate in having colleagues who have been willing to allow me to teach Greek on occasion when course releases or departmental variety allowed openings for the few courses taught in any given year. In treatment of dramatic authors, students were usually exposed for the first time to Doric meters and dialect, and sometimes revisiting their Attic forms after a semester with Homer. Most of all, in this genre, we were able to treat performance practice and theory alongside questions of syntax, history, humor, and culture. I was also able to use my comedy performances as aids to understanding questions of staging and humor, to help develop students' oral Greek skills, and to keep translation sessions lively and informative. The first Greek course I had the opportunity to teach also required me to learn how to teach a split course. The three advanced students and I enjoyably read portions of Sophokles over Friday coffee to fulfill their differentiated reading requirement.
Advanced Greek – Greek 381A – Highlights
from Herodotos’ Histories |
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Elementary Latin – (Focus, by Susan Shelmerdine)
– Latin 101, Latin 102 |
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Intermediate Latin – The First Link below is my most recent intermediate
discovery and one which I will stay with for some
time. Intermediate
Latin – The Worlds of Roman Women, Focus text and Online Companion BU
Fall 2008 Intermediate Latin
I (readings from Millionaire's Dinner Party and Libellus) Intermediate II
(Ovid Amores/Metamorphoses, Vergil Aeneid -Dido& Aeneas) - assignments only Intermediate II (Cicero de Amicitia, Ovid Amores/Metamorphoses) Intermediate
II (Plautus' Poenulus, Catullus - Lesbia, Ovid Metamorphoses) Student Evaluation Summary and Comments for Latin 101 and 102 - UNCG and Agnes Scott |
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Advanced Latin – Latin
Historians (Caesar, Tacitus, Ammianus Marcellinus) on Gallic and Germanic Ethnicity 2008 Passion in Ovid’s
Metamorphoses and other poetry 2008 Cicero and the End
of the Roman Republic 2009 Roman Drama Student Evaluation Summary for Roman Comedy Undergraduate and MEd 2001 Didactic Poetry
(Lucretius & Ovid's Fasti) Student Evaluation Summary and Comments for
Lucretius and Ovid
2005 Latin 304: Lucretius 3 & Ovid Metamorphoses 1 - 2006 Student Evaluation Summary and Comments for Livy and Sallust I taught the Comedy MEd course in spring 2005
reading my student focused edition of Plautus’ Poenulus
and Martin’s scholarly edition of Terence’s Adelphoe
to promote teaching applications and scholarly rigor within their single
semester of comedy. Since comedy is a peripheral topic to teachers’ secondary
curriculum, MEd student assignments included practice in oral Latin skills,
and use of comedy in Latin to teach culture and to motivate secondary student
interest in drama and active language. Discussions often centered around practical teaching strategies and resources, and
these MEd candidates presented scholarly article reviews and comedy teaching
modules for peer review. |