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Atlantis Otherwise expands the study of the African diaspora by
focusing on postcolonial literary expressions from Latin America
and Africa. The book studies the presence of classical references
in texts written by writers (black and non-black) who are committed
to the articulation of the fragmented history of the African
experience from the Middle Passage to the present outside of
Euro-centric views. Consequently, this book addresses the silencing
of the African Diaspora within the official discourses of Latin
America and Hispanic Africa, as well as the limitations that
linguistic and geographic boundaries have imposed upon scholarship.
The contributors address questions related to the categories of
race and cultural identity by analyzing a diverse body of
Afro-Latin American and Afro-Hispanic receptions of classical
literature and its imaginaries. Literary texts in Spanish and
Portuguese written in countries such as Brazil, Colombia, and
Equatorial Guinea provide the opportunity for a transnational and
trans-linguistic examination of the use of classical tropes and
themes in twentieth-century drama, fiction, folklore studies, and
narrative.
Greek Prostitutes in the Ancient Mediterranean, 800 BCE-200 CE
challenges the often-romanticised view of the prostitute as an
urbane and liberated courtesan by examining the social and economic
realities of the sex industry in Greco-Roman culture. Departing
from the conventional focus on elite society, these essays consider
the Greek prostitute as displaced foreigner, slave, and member of
an urban underclass. The contributors draw on a wide range of
material and textual evidence to discuss portrayals of prostitutes
on painted vases and in the literary tradition, their roles at
symposia (Greek drinking parties), and their place in the everyday
life of the polis. Reassessing many assumptions about the people
who provided and purchased sexual services, this volume yields a
new look at gender, sexuality, urbanism, and economy in the ancient
Mediterranean world.
Aspasia of Miletus is, next to Sappho and Cleopatra, the best known woman of the ancient Mediterranean. Yet continued uncritical reception of her depiction in Attic comedy and the naive acceptance of Plutarch's account of her in his "Life of Pericles" have hindered us from understanding both who she was or may have been and her actual contributions to Greek thought. Combining traditional philological and historical methods of analysis with feminist critical perspectives, Madeleine Henry traces the construction of Aspasia of Miletus's biographical tradition and shows how it has prevented her from taking her place as a contributor to the philosophical enterprise, and how continued belief in this icon has helped sexualize all women's achievements.
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