Calenda Announcement 1,432,236 (excerpts)
The seminar “ What Does the Polis Do?” aims to explore various aspects of the contemporary democratic crisis in light of the intellectual debates, social tensions, and practical conflicts arising from political experiences in antiquity—within Athenian democracy, but also beyond. We assume that historians, in their engagement with the past, cannot help but ask questions about the present, thereby advocating for “a controlled use of anachronism,” to borrow Nicole Loraux’s phrase. This research aims to reconcile the methodological requirements and critical rigor of a rigorous historical approach with the goal of understanding references to antiquity in the contemporary social and political sphere, and to examine the fruitfulness and limitations of certain historical analogies, in theoretical and/or activist contexts.
