The Center for Ancient Studies at the University of Pennsylvania is pleased to announce the 2020 graduate conference, “Movement, Mobility, and the Journey: Ancient Actions and Perspectives” to be held Friday, February 28 – Saturday, February 29, 2020, on the University of Pennsylvania campus (Philadelphia, PA, USA)
People are in motion in many ways: in their daily lives, in mass migrations, and in chains of interactions involving places, things, and other people. Motion embodies a multiplicity of action, resulting in creation, exchange, and the production and consumption of energy, amongst countless possibilities. To conceptualize motion in the ancient world, many routes of study can be utilized to answer questions such as how do ancient perceptions of motion affect human action? In what ways did movement lead to the establishment of place? How are concepts of motion, such as the “journey” and “pilgrimage” employed in ancient literature? How do things or people facilitate movement?
This conference is open to graduate students and early career scholars and will showcase a wide variety of papers which focus on two main aspects of motion: the physical motion of people, places, and things, and the concept of motion in ancient cultures. Submissions from all disciplines regarding the ancient world are welcomed with reference to the following broader themes:
● Motion and travel in ancient text and literature
● Human movement in the ancient world
● Pathways, waterways, roads, and trails through both local and large-scale environments
● Journeys, pilgrimages, and migration events – including the movement of objects, plants, and animals with or via their human counterparts.
● Displays of motion and movement visually and symbolically
● Revolutionary technologies of transportation and their effects on ancient society
● Modern methods of understanding ancient mobility, such as remote sensing, experimental archaeology, isotope analysis, etc.
Please submit a title, an abstract (limit: 250 words), and a current CV in a single email to cas.upenn@gmail.com by Sunday, December 10, 2019. Presentations should be no more than twenty minutes in length. Accepted participants will be notified by January 10, 2020. Limited travel funds are available through the Center.
