Carlos Noreña
@carlosfnorena.bsky.social
Ancient Historian @ UC Berkeley • 🇪🇦 • politics | sports | electronic music • He/Him
Three Mayan artifacts (c. 600-900 CE) from the Arts of Indigenous America gallery at the de Young Museum. Ceramic plate with tribute scene; ceramic vessel with sacrifice scene; stone stele depicting a ruler opening portal to spirit world. I see ancient W Asian parallels here... #GlobalAntiquity
Writing on higher education in the US that is carefully researched, thoughtful, addressed to the whole spectrum of higher-ed institutions, always with material conditions in view, and not warped by the grinding of an axe. Please?
Painters: "We'll cover everything with plastic. Nothing will get in there." The cats: "We'll see about that."
Just completed my Roman Empire syllabus for F26. Half of the assigned readings in modern scholarship are by women. Why? Because these were the best pieces for what I needed. That's all. No grand design! If your Roman history syllabus doesn't have scholarship by women, you're really missing out.
"I have made an appropriate correction, which again I owe to a remark of T. D. Barnes, and in doing so cannot resist observing that he and I share a rare distinction, of having made a mistake at the very beginning of a book. It is indeed impossible to check everything..." 1/2
The slow disappearance of DUE DATES from system-generated letter-of-recommendation requests appears to be complete. A catastrophe for the conscientious but overburdened makers of carefully curated "to do" lists.
Read the *Atlantic* article. It was not quite as bad as I had expected, but in one particular was far worse, i.e., the account of the deliberations of the search committee in the sciences. To make this info public is simply unconscionable. An egregious breach of professional and ethical standards.
Sunday stroll in the UC Berkeley Botanical Garden... Classicists: note the papyrus plant in the lower right. 📜
I read *Things Fall Apart* many years ago, and it remains one of my favorite novels of all time. I read *Americanah* last year and really enjoyed it. Am now finishing *The Joys of Motherhood* and have found it deeply moving. It has finally hit me: Nigerian literature is amazing! Will read more...
Hey, Gary, I'm gonna stack these old issues of The American Historical Review on this unused desk. No! That's where we put our EXOTICA! You can set them next to the broken Mr. Coffee on the other unused desk.
Carlos Noreña@carlosfnorena.bsky.social · last wk.Prompted by the recent Axelrod dismissal of Francesca Hong as purveyor of "zany liberal faculty lounge exotica." FACULTY LOUNGE EXOTICA
The "faculty lounge" is a signifier for discourses about professors as pampered, out of touch, and unproductive fools who luxuriate at taxpayer and tuition-paying-parent expense while trafficking in esoteric and un-American ideas. Its hold on the fevered imagination of our commentariat is total.
Wow. Recently released still shot from the first reading of the screenplay for The Odyssey. Remarkable behind-the-scenes illustration of Sir Christopher Nolan's commitment to his "vision."
When it comes to summer trips, I must insist on the distinction between "traveling" and "vacation." Traveling is guidebooks, agendas, museums, restaurants, history, culture, learning, and discovery. Vacation is being in your bathing suit all day long. The two modes cannot operate simultaneously.
Guys. The birds in the bush are *low-quality* birds. That's why it takes two of 'em to equal the value of a higher-quality bird-in-the-hand bird. Few understand this.
This is an important story, beyond the world of sports. There were BIG MONEY interests at stake here. But *organized opposition* to a cartoonishly corrupt sell-off torpedoed the plan. Almost immediately. There is a lesson here.
Infantino scraps FIFA World Cup sell-off plan after backlash
FIFA president Gianni Infantino has scrapped his proposal to sell stakes in the World Cup after widespread backlash, including from within global soccer's governing body, and a threatened boycott by European Nations.
espn.com
I have already seen a few *published* reviews of THE review—already rather remarkable—and this morning have encountered an extended and serious discussion of one of the reviews of the review. So recklessly do we hurtle towards a rift in the space-time continuum.
The sonic qualities of vintage analog synthesizers, c. 1970-1986, with emphasis on the big and aggressive "American" sound (Moog, Oberheim, Sequential Circuits) vs. the smooth and dreamy "Japanese" sound (Roland, Yamaha, Korg). Lots of technical details here, especially filter types and topologies.
ETX Gov@etxgov.myatproto.social · 3w agoYou've got a captive audience on a plane, and you know they can't open the doors and yeet you out. What subject are you gonna do a 30 minute sermon on?
Looking through my Discourse Wheel, I see that we are long overdue for the next round of the BC/AD vs. BCE/CE discourse. To rectify this, I have scheduled a provocation on this matter for Friday, when the Emily Wilson and latest right-on-schedule Fall of Rome discourses will be losing steam.
My 20 favorite reference works in classics/ancient history (for usefulness or because fun to use!), ranked: 20. DE 19. RIC 18. FGrH 17. IG 16. LIMC 15. RS 14. SEG 13. ILLRP 12. FIRA 11. RRC 10. RPC 9. AE 8. PIR 7. RE 6. BMCRE 5. OCD 4. MRR 3. LTUR 2. CIL 1. TLL
Welp, I have finally seen it, and to my mild dismay—as one who loves Homeric epic, is a fan of most Nolan movies, and is easily absorbed by this sort of cinematic spectacle—I was (gasp) a little underwhelmed. Not bored, exactly, but vaguely unsatisfied, I suppose. 1/2
Carlos Noreña@carlosfnorena.bsky.social · last mo.I intend to enjoy the cinematic experience. I bet it will be immersive and larger-than-life and *fun*. I could not be bothered less by "incorrect" armor or Telemachus calling him "dad" (etc.). But it won't match what's in my head. It can't! To judge it that way seems a little . . . myopic. 5/5
A little surprised there isn't more chatter on here about Christopher Nolan's new Universal Pictures movie, *The Odyssey* (R).
Humility is confidence. Conceding a point in debate, or acknowledging that an assumption might have been wrong, or admitting ignorance on a given topic, or offering to learn more and rethink a position, are not signs of weakness but of strength and security. The blowhards always miss this.
Resistance to what we may call "the new global antiquity" is usually expressed in one of the three following ways: 1. This isn't new at all. 2. It's not "global," bro. 3. It can't be done. There is some truth to all three! But let us reflect a bit on these claims... 1/20
I have completed all mandatory safety and prevention and precaution and best-practice and additional/supplementary safety video training sessions as required by the state and the campus and the university, and I am therefore and as a direct result ⭐️ IN FULL COMPLIANCE ⭐️ We are not the same.
This piece—entitled "Beyond Greece and Rome," and arguing for a global expansion in the western vision of what "ancient history" is—happened to appear during the frenzied opening of Nolan's *Odyssey*, which reveals the enduring gravitational pull of the most canonical Greek story. A juxtaposition.
Carlos Noreña@carlosfnorena.bsky.social · 4w agoAncient history has gone global. This is surely the most exciting development in the field in the last 30 years! But what "global antiquity" is and how we should study it—and why anyone should care—are all open (and challenging) questions. Some thoughts on all of this for @aeon.co.
If we hope to speak in any meaningful way about an interconnected "ancient Afro-Eurasia," we have to begin with the Indian Ocean. I think we have a new baseline for the topic ⬇️
Jeremy Simmons@caeliambulator.bsky.social · 4w agoOut today!
