Graduate Students' research follows Greek Statues to Berlin
April 14, 2016
Graduate student Frederika Tevebring is spending the 2015/16 academic year in Berlin through the support of the Social Science Research Council’s (SSRC) International Dissertation Research Fellowship (IDRF). In Berlin she is doing research for her dissertation on the mythical figure Baubo and its reception in nineteenth century Germany. Frederika is particularly interested in how Baubo, who was often described as obscene and grotesque, clashed with German ideas of Greece as an ideal civilization. Her research includes work in the archives of the Berlin museums. The work has been productive, although she is discovering that archival work has its own particular challenges. “Sometimes I spend hours deciphering a hand written letter that turns out to be mostly about the archaeologist’s worried mother or who ate the most potato salad at the latest party.” In January she travelled to San Francisco to present her findings at the Annual meeting of the Society for Classical Studies. Her panel was called “Sexuality in Ancient Art” and generated an interesting discussion on how sexuality has been (and perhaps ought to be be) approached in ancient studies. The paper was well received and has been nominated for two awards.