Madeleine Grabarczyk
Madeleine
Madeleine Grabarczyk studies Classics and Islamic Studies at the Johns Hopkins University. She is interested in connections between ancient Greco-Roman civilizations and ancient Near and Middle Eastern civilizations, as well as the experiences of ancient women. She is from Birmingham, Alabama.
Madeleine’s Interview:
Can you share a bit about your background?
“I'm currently an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University. My major is Classics. My minor is Islamic Studies. I have studied Classics my entire undergraduate career. The reason I got into [Classics] is [that] I studied Latin in high school. And [I] came into contact with, just like the bare minimum classical history in that context and then just fell in love with it, and decided to keep studying it.
What led you to join the “Race against Time” research lab/website project?
“ I heard about the project from Dr. [Nandini] Pandey in an advising session. And I thought that it sounded really interesting. And particularly because I, myself, have a lot of questions about the nature of race and the nature of slavery and the nature of social dynamics and all of these different topics in antiquity. That's part of why I study Classics, is to disentangle these things... So all of that is to say, I have a lot of questions about it, about race in antiquity, and that's why I joined the project.”
Can you speak about your contribution to the website?
“My contribution to the website, along with Jackie will be some pieces that revolve around the history of Latin education in the United States. One piece will be comprised of interviews with Latin educators about the state of Latin pedagogy, how the way that Latin is taught — because Latin is for many people, their entry into classics — and what the future of Latin education should be. The other piece will be a resource of guide for anyone who is interested in Latin pedagogy.”
In what ways has your involvement influenced, informed, or benefited you?
“The way that I've most benefited in the course of the project has been in talking to everyone [involved] in the project and hearing their ideas. Every time I come to class, I try to maintain the attitude of ‘I'm here to ask questions and try to find answers to those questions.’ And so interactions [with students and guests] in the class have really been of the biggest benefit for me.”
What do you hope the impact of this project will be?
“ I hope that the impact of this project will be that it will cause readers who visit the website to think more about the assumptions that we make about antiquity and ancient history. I hope that it will challenge people to think about the ways in which our present existence is the same but also the ways in which our present existence is different than how it was in antiquity. And really ask questions about what we know about the experiences of these people, but ultimately to realize that we're human beings, they (ancient people) were human beings, and we can't make them into fictional characters or a different species of thing, because that's just not true. Now we are humans, and then we were humans. And that's why this is interesting ultimately.”
Do you have a message for future students or users of this resource?
“I think my message for future students in the course or to users of the resource would be to remember, in every instance, the human level of this project and the humanity that naturally comes along with studying history and studying ancient people. It's called ‘humanities’ for a reason. I think it's when we start to forget that it is people that we're studying, that's when we lose sight of why it's important to study race, why it's important to study history, why it's important to study basically anything. We need to remember that the purpose is to understand other humans better.”
Madeleine’s contribution to the site:
