Faculty members from the Macalester Classics department offer a January program approximately every other year. Traveling and working together creates strong personal and professional ties. These programs are available to all Macalester students and have included a regular course on ancient Rome and Pompeii, as well as an exploration of the history and archaeology of Turkey in 2006. The most recent January program combined the popular Rome program with travel to Alexandria and Cairo.

Classics 192: Alexandria and Rome: Comparative Ancient and Modern Cities
January 4-20, 2011
Professors Beth Severy-Hoven, Andy Overman and Nanette Goldman

Course Description: Through examination of texts, art and architecture we will study two of the major cosmopolitan centers of the ancient Mediterranean. Commencing in Alexandria, the port city of Alexander the Great, Antony and Cleopatra, we will survey major historical developments from the Pharaonic age, through the Greco-Roman and early Islamic periods, into the modern era. The schedule includes visits to the catacombs, Roman bath complex and theater, the site of the Pharos lighthouse (originally one of the seven wonders of the ancient world), the Alexandria National Museum, mosques of Turkish Town, the synagogue, Coptic cathedral and new Bibliotheca Alexandrina.  In Cairo we will see the Pyramids of Giza, the Sphinx, National Museum of Egyptian Antiquities and spend a night on the Nile. After a week in Egypt we will fly to Rome, where our focus will be the development of this ancient city through to the modern period.  Sites will include republican period temples and theaters, the Forum and Palatine, Forum of Augustus, Ara Pacis, Colosseum, Arch of Titus, Pantheon, Trajan's markets and forum, Stadium of Domitian/Piazza Navona, the port city of Ostia, San Clemente, St. Peter's Basilica and necropolis, the Vatican Museums, medieval Trastevere, Renaissance and Baroque churches and palazzi, and the Jewish Ghetto.  These cities offer students exposure to thousands of years of history, city structures and institutions of differing relationships to imperialism and colonialism, focal points in the development of diverse forms of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and varied challenges in terms of sustainability. Student evaluation is based on participation in group events, presentations, on-site projects, and quizzes.  This course counts toward the Classics major, including its study away requirement, and for the concentration in Urban Studies.”