Course Description
If you have taken an introductory Greek course and would now like to work on your reading fluency in a supportive environment with custom-made resources, you will enjoy this class. Over the course of nine weeks, with two ninety-minute meetings per week, we will be reading large parts of Plato’s Apology of Socrates, one of the most seminal texts in Western literature.
Socrates–a citizen of 5th-century BCE Athens who, as he says, knows nothing, but at least he knows that he knows nothing–has been accused of ‘corrupting the youth’ and ‘not believing in the gods in which the city believes, but in other divine powers’ that are ‘new’ to Athens. If he is convicted of these crimes, the punishment is death by poison. The Apology (ἀπολογία being the Greek word for ‘defence’) is the account of what Socrates says first in his defence and (apologies, spoiler alert) after he has been found guilty.
While our class will of course discuss the philosophical and sociopolitical aspects of both the charge and the defence offered, our focus will be on the grammar of the text. The Apology in itself is fascinating in so many ways, but more than that, its simple, yet elegant prose (Socrates tells us he will speak in court just as he has always spoken while engaging the citizens of Athens) forms an excellent basis for any student wishing to go on to reading other ancient Greek texts on their own.
In parallel to working on our reading fluency in the live classes, there will be weekly vocabulary quizzes based on a list of common ancient Greek vocabulary. Experience shows that these two activities–large amounts of supported reading as well as systematic growing of one’s vocab knowledge–are exactly what students need to get beyond the ‘intermediate’ level of language study.
All materials used in class (a reference grammar as well as an edition of the text with running commentary and translation) will be provided to the students free of charge at the beginning of the course. They are custom-made by the instructor in parallel with her popular materials for Sanskrit and more recent materials for Latin.
Course Structure
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Two 90-minute live lessons will be held per week on Zoom.
- Tuesdays 12-1:30 pm and Thursdays 10-11:30am Pacific Time
- All live sessions will take place via Zoom and will be recorded for later viewing.
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Live sessions will address all student questions, go over exercises and readings together, as well as personalize the learning experience with your instructor.
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Weekly quizzes to test yourself, as well as a mid-term and a final.
Students Will Receive:
- 24 Zoom live class sessions + recordings (90 min each)
- Yogic Studies Certificate upon completion (PDF)
- Access to the private Community Forum
Dr. Antonia M. Ruppel
Lecturer in Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin
Antonia Ruppel is a Classicist by training who came to Sanskrit through a series of fortunate accidents. She learnt the language as an autodidact, and one of her reasons for writing her textbook, The Cambridge Introduction to Sanskrit (2017), was to make the experience of studying Sanskrit easier and more pleasant for others. In 2021, she published the follow-up volume, An Introductory Sanskrit Reader: Improving Reading Fluency, designed to help students gain reading fluency in an enjoyable and straightforward way.
Language pedagogy is at the heart of her life. She has been teaching Sanskrit for almost 20 years at universities such as Cornell, Oxford and the LMU in Munich, Germany, as well as offering courses in variety of formats online.
Listen to our interview with Dr. Ruppel on the Yogic Studies Podcast.
🦚 Catch the Early Bird Enrollment! 🦚
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