Thursday, February 20, 2020
4:30pm
Cohen Hall, Room 402
How do people make sense of new permutations of political power and the threats they pose, in light of the concepts that they inherit, their own strategic aims, and the unintentional inertia that may slow or block conceptual innovation? I explore this question by examining the surprisingly shaky evidence for the fourth-century origin (post-403 BCE) of the term ‘Thirty Tyrants’ in classical Greek political practices and writings and comparing this to later instances of the appellation. I offer both evidence and explanation as to why contemporary fourth-century Athenians and others would have seen the appellation as a paradoxical non sequitur, finding it used as a descriptive label only in much later texts.
Please join us for coffee at 4:00 pm in the second floor Lounge of Cohen Hall.