Congratulations to our 2014 LCC Award winners!

Paul Rehak Award for published scholarship: Holt Parker, "Sex, Popular Beliefs, and Culture," in A Cultural History of Sexuality in the Classical World, ed. Peter Toohey and Mark Golden. Oxford: 2011. 125-44.

Graduate Student Award for an oral paper: Mira Green, "Witnesses and Participants in the Shadows: The Sexual Lives of Enslaved Women and Boys in Ancient Rome" (APA 2013) (Abstract: http://apaclassics.org/annual-meeting/642green )

Activism Award: Ruby Blondell. Ruby was awarded the first-ever LCC Activism Award for being a tireless member of the organization since its foundation and for supporting and promoting LGBT rights outside the context of the organization.

Report on the Lambda Classical Caucus Panel, “Stifling Sexuality,” at the 2014 APA

The Lambda Classical Caucus Panel at the American Philological Association Meeting in Chicago was on Sunday, January 5, at the decidedly early hour of 8:00 AM. Bruce Frier (University of Michigan) and Mark Masterson (Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand), the organizers of the panel of five, were in attendance. Frier ran the session and Masterson made 15 minutes of introductory remarks to prime the audience. The panellists then addressed the topic of informal modes of stifling sexual activity in the ancient world (as opposed to formal means like laws, e.g., the Leges Iuliae). One of the most interesting things about the work of the panellists, though surely not the only thing, was the way in which each of them approached the topic and their evidence, with the fifth panellist even “going meta” on the call for papers.

  Lily Panoussi (College of William & Mary) was up first with “Stupra et Caedes: Homosexuality, Women’s Rituals, and the State in Livy’s Bacchanalian Narrative.” She identified a rift in Roman society in the matter of sex between males: evidently not all felt it was the worst thing ever. The lack of stifling then called forth an overwhelming response from the Roman state. Livy’s narrative surely casts an interesting light on Augustan Rome. 

“Mature Praeceptor Amoris Seeks Tops (Discreet): Desire and Deniability in Tibullus 1.4” by Robert Matera (University of Southern California) was next. This paper teased out the way the poetic voice in the elegy engages in double-speak. In language that is ambiguous at one particular moment in the poem, the poet apparently offers his services as praeceptor and/or his anus for penetration. Matera suggested that the fact that the meaning is double means that there is plausible deniability, and this deniability is evidence both of the regime dedicated to stifling passive male sexuality and of a position contesting this regime at the same time.

In the third paper, “The Art of Not Loving,” E. Del Chrol (Marshall University) looked at the activities of a praeceptor who could hardly be more different from Tibullus. Perceiving in Ovid’s advice to would-be amatores both anxiety about the power of love to attenuate masculine mastery and a belief that true love is a veritable disease, Chrol suggested that there is a strong undercurrent of discouragement of love and desire in Ovid. Chrol substantiated his observations by a resort to the association of erotic passion with illness in poetry, the novels, and curse tablets. Ovid on Chrol’s reading wants to stifle all sexuality.

In “Sex and Homosexuality in Suetonius’ Caesares,” Molly M. Pryzwansky (North Carolina State University) proposed that the hostility to sex between males that scholars have been liable to see in Suetonius’ lives of the rulers of Rome has been overplayed. Suetonius was more concerned about the abuse of subordinates, or about a lack of concern for hierarchy in and through sex, than he was about the kind of sex emperors were having. Taking on Pryzwansky’s arguments, we see evidence of a lack of investment in the stifling that we are often told was of such great importance to the ancients; another rift was revealed in her paper. (This paper was read by Brett M. Rogers [University of Puget Sound], as Pryzwansky was not able to attend due to the weather.)

H. Christian Blood (Yonsei University, South Korea) “went meta” on the call for papers in his offering for the panel: “Stifling ‘Scare Figures.’” Looking at the sweep of antiquity in his broad position paper, Blood suggested that in looking at the kinaidos/cinaedus we should not focus exclusively on the notion of a man cross-dressing and allowing penetration. Blood counselled starting (at least some of the time) from an idea of the kinaidos/cinaedus as a person who in the first place considers herself a woman, even though she possesses male genitalia. This paper was a strong recommendation that Classicists engage more with current theoretical investigations of transgenderism to envision a “trans-antiquity.” The paper’s title was playful, and this is where the “meta” part was abundantly showcased. Referring to John Winkler’s influential idea of the kinaidos as a “scare figure,” Blood proposed that Winkler’s idea has been stifling and delaying an engagement with transgender theory, that sexuality as a concept has been doing the same thing, and, finally, that it might be time to stifle this scare figure itself.

The audience was engaged and there were good questions from them and from the panellists. There were more questions and comments out there than could be accommodated. Discussion surely could have gone on for an hour. 

Mark Masterson

Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand

Call for nominations, LCC student paper award

While the APA is fresh in your minds, send in your nominations for the next LCC student paper award. The nomination process is super-easy: just email your nomination to Deb Kamen (dkamen@uw.edu). Self-nominations are STRONGLY encouraged! Full details at http://lambdacc.org/awards/graduate.html.

Call for new male co-Chair of LCC

Because Bruce Frier’s three-year term as LCC co-Chair is up at the end of this year, we’ll be holding elections for a new male co-Chair at January’s APA Meetings.

The LCC co-Chairs are responsible for the following duties:

-Conducting the business of the LCC.

-Overseeing the process by which LCC prizes and grants are awarded.

-Facilitating efforts by members to present panels and workshops at the annual conventions of the APA.

-Reserving space for the annual business meeting during the annual APA convention, as well as running the meeting.

-Co-organizing (with the WCC and CSWMG) the opening-night party of the annual APA convention.

If you are interested in running for this position, please email me (dkamen@uw.edu) and Bruce (bwfrier@umich.edu) in advance of the convention. Elections will be held at the LCC business meeting on Saturday, January 4, 2.30-4pm.

The OPPORTUNITY of a LIFETIME membership!

I am writing to remind everyone that at the last LCC meeting in Seattle, the members decided to raise the price of a lifetime membership in the Lambda Classical Caucus from $200 to $250 on January 1, 2014.  So if you have been thinking at all about becoming a lifetime member, you should act now to lock in the current lower rate.  This is equal to just ten years of regular dues--compare this to how long you expect to be a part of the LCC, and you will see how great a bargain this is!  Use this link to get to the LCC web site where you can download the dues form or use Paypal to make your payment.  Or skip the dues form, if your membership information hasn't changed, and just put a check in the mail to me with a little note.  I will be happy to acknowledge your membership upgrade!

All best,
Jorge J. Bravo III

LCC Graduate Student Travel Award

If you're a graduate student member of the LCC and will be delivering a paper at the 2014 APA-AIA conference, you might consider applying for an LCC Graduate Student Travel Award!

To apply for the $150 award, students must detail their involvement in the LCC and its mission; demonstrate their financial need; and provide the title of the paper they will be delivering at the APA-AIA. Recipients of the travel award will be expected to provide a brief report on their use of the award for Iris, the blog of the LCC.

Applications should be submitted to LCC Co-Chairs Deborah Kamen (dkamen@uw.edu) and Bruce Frier (bwfrier@umich.edu) by October 31, 2013.

Costume Theme for Chicago

Since 2003 in New Orleans, the LCC has been setting a costume theme for the opening WCC/LCC party. The theme is based on the topic of the LCC's panel (this year: 'Stifling Sexuality?') and on the city where the meetings are held. This year, as a tribute to Chicago and Mrs O'Leary's cow, our costume theme is:* 'Putting Out the Fire (Or Fanning the Flames?).*' The general subject is fire, both literal and metaphorical (but no actual fire, please!), any costume related to the idea of fire. (In a pinch, even cow costumes are acceptable.) There will be prizes! There will be honor!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_O'Leary

CFP, APA 2015

CALL FOR PAPERS

Humoerotica

Lambda Classical Caucus Panel, American Philological Association

New Orleans, January 8-11, 2015

Organizers: Ruby Blondell (blondell@uw.edu) and Kate Topper (ktopper@uw.edu)

Humor and sex have walked hand in hand since time immemorial. For this panel, we invite submissions on the many manifestations of this relationship in the ancient world, with a specific focus on intersections between humor and homoeroticism. Abstracts related to any aspect of this theme are encouraged from all areas of classical studies.

We are interested in questions of definition, and the application of comic theory to the ancient world. Why is sex such a prominent theme for humor? What counts as humorous, and how do we identify it, especially in cultures so distant in time and space from our own? What “work” did sexual humor do for the Greeks and Romans – did it challenge conventional approaches to sexuality, did it reinforce these approaches, or could it do both? Is comedy inherently hostile towards its subjects, or can it be celebratory? Is homoerotic humor ever used at the expense of heteroeroticism? What modern approaches have helped to advance our understanding of sex and humor in the ancient world? How about ancient theories (e.g. Aristotle)?

We also welcome analysis of specific texts and artifacts. While Greek and Roman comedy provide an obvious and valuable resource, we encourage submissions on a wide range of genres and forms of evidence. Sexual humor features in the full spectrum of Greek and Latin texts, from oratory (with its comic invective), to lyric poetry (with its sexual innuendo and obscenity), to satirical prose and verse (Juvenal, Petronius, Lucian), and even philosophy (which features, notably, the humorously homoerotic persona of Socrates). In keeping with the traditions of the LCC, we also hope to include papers dealing with material evidence, such as painting, graffiti or mosaics. Abstracts might address, for example, the visual humor of the Eurymedon vase or of erotic wall-paintings at Pompeii. Other suitable themes include  intersections between visual and textual sources, the role of sexual humor in cultural institutions (such as religious cult), and the comic reception of ancient homoeroticism. Papers might also draw attention to evidence that remains underexplored or deserves a second look.

Abstracts, of 650 words or less, are due by March 10, 2014. Do not identify yourself in any way in the abstract itself, and please do not send it to the organizers. It should be sent as an email attachment to Jorge Bravo (jbravo@umd.edu), who will forward it to the organizers in anonymous form. Please follow the APA's formatting guidelines for individual abstracts (http://www.apaclassics.org/index.php/annual_meeting/abstract_instructions/guidelines_for_authors_of_abstracts).

LCC ACTIVISM AWARD

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The LCC's mission statement declares, "the purpose of the Caucus is twofold: scholarly and political." If our scholarly purpose is (in brief) to support queer scholarship, our political purpose is (in brief) to support queer politics. In the 23 years since the Caucus was founded, we have done an increasingly successful job in fulfilling the former purpose, both by organizing panels and by offering awards for scholarly work. Our political purpose has, by contrast, been confined to the valuable yet limited role of providing queer scholars with the support of a like-minded community.

In order to redress this imbalance, at the LCC meeting in Seattle in January 2013 the members voted to institute an Activism Award of $100, to be given either annually or as often as a fitting nominee is presented. The award is intended to honor an LCC member who has worked to promote the rights and well-being of sexual minorities in ways that go beyond the usual academic missions of teaching and scholarship. Such work should have taken place at any time within the past five years, and might include (without being limited to) any of the following:

-- Volunteering with, or advising, college or community groups

-- Working for political initiatives, causes, or candidates (locally or nationally)

-- Engaging in public advocacy (e.g. through op-eds, letters to the editor, blogs, websites, or social media)

-- Organizing and/or participating in protests or other forms of resistance to hate and oppression

The nomination process is extremely simple. Send either of the co-chairs, or the treasurer, the name of the person who deserves such recognition, with a very brief description of the reason (e.g. the name of the organization for which they have worked). We will then contact the nominee for more details. All LCC members are eligible, including students and other non-paying members. Self-nominations are encouraged, but since we are hoping to reach the unsung heroes among us, we urge you to nominate those who may be too modest to identify themselves. Please note that nominators need not themselves be members of the LCC. Nominations will be accepted throughout the year, but for recognition at the APA they should be received by October 31st in the preceding year. Unsuccessful nominations will remain on file for consideration in subsequent years.

Subject: LCC Panel Call for Papers: DEADLINE EXTENDED!

The Lambda Classical Caucus CFP for the 2014 APA/AIA meetings in Chicago has been extended until March 17, the date that the WCC is also using. The Chicago LCC panel topic, which is presented in full below, is an attractive one: how cultural and social efforts to maintain sexual "morality" can often fail, either by falling flat or even by attracting newcomers to "vice." Some of us will remember the 1962 movie Advise and Consent, in which a naive young Senator was inveigled into entering an underground gay bar in Washington; the bar was preposterously stereotyped as a "den of iniquity," but tens of thousands of closeted gay men got their very first sight of such a "den" and they never looked back. Similar effects are sure to have been common also in antiquity. Were Petronius' readers necessarily all that revolted by the Priapic hijinks in Quartilla's country home? And how would such titillated readers read, say, an epic, whose generic law demanded decorum that stifled sexual expression? Did such decorum rule reception?

Stifling Sexuality?

Although, at least before the later Empire, sexual behavior between individuals of the same biological sex is widely tolerated in Greek and Roman law, expressions of personal or social disapproval are by no means unusual. Setting to one side the often uncertain status of pederasty, we note that many authors react to same-sex sexual conduct with distaste or even disgust, and subliterate attitudes, emerging in papyri or Pompeian graffiti, exhibit similar levels of hostility. A representative example, perhaps, of unofficial attitudes is Clement of Alexandria, who writes in his Paedagogus at 3.3.23: "I admire the ancient legislators of the Romans: they detested effeminate conduct and, according to their law of justice, they deemed it worthy of the pit to engage in carnal intercourse as the female, against the law of nature." Clement states that these laws were no longer enforced in Alexandria ca. 200 CE.

How should we evaluate expressions of disdain like Clement's? How effective are they likely to have been, either in conjunction with legal restrictions or independent of them? It is clear, for instance, that social controls are often adopted or relied upon when law is deemed ineffective for one reason or another. An example is ancient attitudes towards rights of authorship, which were fairly vigilant even though copyright itself did not yet exist; outright plagiarism was not remotely so common as one might have anticipated, see Katharina Schickert, Der Schutz literarischer Urheberschaft im Rom der klassischen Antike (2005).

Should we posit something similar for same-sex behavior? How did social views interact with legal restrictions? Were social controls successful in deterring at least public displays of same-sex conduct? Did social controls modulate displays in certain respects, or lead to the expression of same-sex desire in oblique ways?

Papers are invited on the widest possible basis consistent with this general theme. They may examine norms (alone or in conjunction with law), or look more closely at particular authors or particular forms of sexual conduct, including not just sexual intercourse but also behavior or dress identified with sexual minorities. We also welcome papers that consider connections between these norms and expectations of gender performance conforming to roles for women or men. The general aim of the panel will be to focus closely on this topic of informal modes of control and resultant expression, and so to encourage the development of scholarship concerning them.

Submissions should be anonymous, and otherwise adhere to APA guidelines for the formatting of abstracts. Please do not send abstracts to panel organizers; e-mail them as word documents to Ruby Blondell (Blondell@uw.edu). Questions may be addressed to the panel organizers: Bruce Frier (bwfrier@umich.edu) or Mark Masterson (Mark.Masterson@vuw.ac.nz). The NEW deadline is March 17, 2013.