Events

Prof. Dr. Caroline Vout (Cambridge)
What is Roman about Roman representations of sex?

This lecture takes a comparative look at the visual material that the literature on gender and sexuality traditionally considers as "Greek" or "Roman". Aware of the problems of, and overlaps between, these categories, and respectful of exceptions to any rule, it seeks to find patterns and to explain these patterns both in terms of specific contexts of use and broader cultural mores. It contends that there are subtle yet important differences in how these bodies of material see sex and gender, and that these have as much to say about politics as they do about physical relations. Rome emerges as more sensitive than we might think, adapting its Greek artistic inheritance to explore and escape the anxieties of a hierarchical, multicultural empire.