Princeton University's tradition of deep commitment to the humanities has long been connected to Greece and Hellenic culture, from antiquity to the present. On Tuesday, Nov. 1, the University added a formal home base for Princeton scholars in Greece with the opening of the Princeton University Athens Center for Research and Hellenic Studies. Three years in the planning, the Center is led by the University's Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies.
President Christopher L.
Eisgruber (second from right) leads the ribbon cutting at the Nov. 1 opening
reception for the new Princeton University Athens Center for Research and
Hellenic Studies with, from left, Seeger Trustee Mary O' Boyle; Christopher Cone,
chair of the Seeger Board of Trustees; Dimitri Gondicas, founding director of
Princeton's Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies; and Seeger Trustee Shirley M.
Tilghman, emerita president of the University and professor of molecular
biology and public affairs. Every year, the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies
supports more than 100 Princetonians for study and research in Greece. (Photo by Kostas Mpekas for the Princeton
University Athens Center for Research and Hellenic Studies)
"An academic
home in Greece embodies some of the key goals of the Stanley J. Seeger Hellenic
Fund, established in 1979," said Dimitri Gondicas, founding director of the
Seeger Center and a 1978 alumnus. "Creating the Princeton Athens Center
was consistent with the vision of our benefactor, Stanley J. Seeger '52, whose
legendary generosity made it possible for Princeton to be a world leader in
Hellenic studies." Every year, the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies supports
more than 100 Princetonians for study and research in Greece, said Gondicas.
At an evening
reception at the new Center, Gondicas opened his remarks in Greek: "Kalos
orisate! Welcome! … Princeton has enjoyed strong, enduring links with the
Hellenic world, and it has been an international leader in the study of Greek
culture. As scholars, educators, philanthropists, public servants, business
people, art collectors and writers, Princetonians have contributed immensely to
the cultural and international relations between Greece and the United
States."
Princeton
President Christopher L. Eisgruber participated in the ribbon-cutting ceremony
and greeted the 55 guests including faculty, students, friends, and more than
30 undergraduate and graduate alumni spanning more than 50 years.
"This is the first time Princeton
University has opened a research and scholarship center anywhere outside of the
United States," said Eisgruber, Class of 1983. Acknowledging the
"extraordinary generosity and vision" of Seeger's gifts and the gifts
of many alumni attending the reception, Eisgruber said that one of the reasons
the University chose to establish the center in Athens "as we become a
more international university" is Princeton's "extraordinary
humanistic tradition that finds its home here in Athens and in Greece."
He said these alumni gifts ask the
University "to build upon the study of ancient and modern Greece and to do
so in a way that understands the broad influence of Greece in the world. As we
seek to make this enterprise succeed ... we will depend on our connections here
in Greece to make this a thriving hub of activity."
The Center — located in
the Stanley J. Seeger '52 House, a 1930s-era townhouse in downtown Athens
renovated by Athens-based A6Architects — features conference facilities, a
seminar room, offices, study spaces, informal common areas and a terrace with a
view of the Parthenon in the distance. (Photo by Yannis Stathopoulos for A6Architects)
The Center — located in the Stanley J.
Seeger '52 House, a 1930s-era townhouse in downtown Athens renovated by Nasos
Antachopoulos and Yannis Younis of Athens-based A6Architects — features
conference facilities, a seminar room, offices, study spaces, informal common
areas and a terrace with a view of the Parthenon in the distance. Situated down
the street from Aristotle's Lyceum in a historic, diverse neighborhood, the
center is close to libraries, museums and archaeological sites.
Earlier in the day, Eisgruber toured the
facility; met with Seeger trustees, Princeton faculty and staff; and took a
guided visit of the Acropolis Museum.
The reception included remarks by Seeger
Trustee Peter R. Brown, the Philip and Beulah Rollins Professor of History,
Emeritus, on behalf of the Seeger family, and a performance by Nikos
Michailidis, a native of Greece and 2016 graduate alumnus in anthropology and Hellenic
studies, who sang a Greek folk song that he composed for this
occasion, accompanied by the pontic lyra.
Also attending
were Christopher Cone, president of the Stanley J. Seeger Hellenic Fund; Shirley M. Tilghman, emerita president of the
University and professor of molecular biology and public affairs;
Anastasia Vrachnos, vice provost, international affairs and operations and a
1991 alumna; and Kathleen Crown, executive director of the Council of
the Humanities.
"Thanks to
Dimitri Gondicas and his inspired colleagues, this research center will
continue to inspire a new generation of students and scholars," Tilghman
said.
"The Center enhances the University's
international profile, emphasizes our increasingly global outlook and showcases
areas of excellence for Princeton scholarship," Vrachnos said.
Gondicas added that the Princeton Athens
Center is designed to extend international opportunities across academic
disciplines. "We have strong interest on the part of colleagues in the
natural sciences and engineering to be part of this new venture, so they can
engage actively with their counterparts and students in Greece."
On the morning of Nov. 2, Benjamin Morison, professor of philosophy,
led a "research-in-progress" precept with 11 Princeton sophomores who
had taken the team-taught yearlong Humanities Sequence (HUM) — which covers
2,500 years of Western culture from Homer to Virginia Woolf — their freshman
year. First-year students who have completed the course may apply to travel to
Greece or Rome during fall break of their sophomore year, fully funded by the
University. Nicolette D'Angelo, a member of the Class of 2019 and a HUM
sequence "alumna," shares her account of
her experience visiting Greece this week on Princeton's Instagram.
After lunch at a neighborhood restaurant,
the students had a guided tour of the National Archaeological Museum. The
activities continued with an evening of music at the Center, cosponsored by the
Princeton Club of Greece, featuring traditional songs of Greece and Asia Minor.
Learning from the Hellenic world: Ancient, Medieval and Modern
Opportunities for Princeton students to
study and conduct research in Greece range from an archaeological excavation in
northern Greece to PIIRS Global Seminars focused
on history and theater.
Michael Cadden, chair of Princeton's Lewis Center for
the Arts, has twice co-taught "Re:Staging the Greeks," crosslisted in theater and
Hellenic studies, with a spring break trip to Greece. In summer 2012, he
co-taught the course as a six-week PIIRS Global Seminar, which he will teach
again in summer 2017.
"I love the
idea of having a Princeton home base in Athens to help center our activities
and to encourage contact with other Princeton faculty and students pursuing
projects in Greece," Cadden said. "And we'll be able to invite our
Greek friends over to our place. The Greeks take hospitality very
seriously!"
Edwin Rosales, a
senior who is majoring in English and earning certificates
in theater, creative writing and Latino
studies, took "Re:Staging the Greeks" last spring. He is
writing a play as one of his two senior theses and said, "I would not have
been as inspired as I am now to take risks in my pieces, and to try to find the
human passion and raw feeling of joy in every moment I put on stage, if I had
not visited Athens and learned about how the people of Athens find this joy,
passion and opportunities to take risks and enjoy life as they do."
Sahand Keshavarz Rahbar, a senior who is
majoring in history, first visited Greece in fall 2014 as part of the
course "The Apostle Paul in Text and Context," taught by AnneMarie Luijendijk, professor of religion.
"As a historian, I am often struck by the idea of the ineffable — those
sights and sounds that escape description," he said. "Study abroad
provides students with the opportunity to capture those senses, to more fully
envision the particulars that eluded their understanding when reading a hefty
textbook or journal article."
Rahbar returned
to Greece two more times — in summer 2015, for an internship at the Stavros
Niarchos Foundation in Athens and to participate in the PIIRS Global Seminar
"Thessaloniki: 2,000 Years of a City in History," taught by Molly Greene, professor of history and
Hellenic studies and a 1993 graduate alumna who attended the center's opening
reception; and in summer 2016, to volunteer at a refugee camp, all funded in
part by the Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies, with the support of The Paul
Sarbanes '54 Fund for Hellenism and Public Service. "My trips allowed me
to become a part of history, and to gain an intimacy with past events that I
could never achieve in a classroom, thousands of miles away," he said.
Senior Claire
Ashmead, who is concentrating in history and earning certificates in humanistic studies, East Asian studies and
creative writing, traveled to Greece over fall break 2014 after taking the HUM
sequence, which she said was like a pilgrimage in learning about "the
origin of Western culture." As part of that trip, she also completed an
independent project on the 20th-century Greek artist, writer and scholar Nikos
Hadjikyriakos-Ghika, with funding from Princeton's David A. Gardner '69 Magic
Project.
In partnership with Hellenic studies, the
Council of the Humanities hosts faculty-led trips to Greece and organized
Princeton's first journalism seminar abroad last summer,
called "Reporting on the Front Lines of History — in Greece."
Hayley Roth, a
senior who is majoring in the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and
International Affairs, participated in that course, in which students honed
on-the-ground reporting skills while covering the refugee crisis and meeting
with journalists. "The course posed the thrilling challenge of frontline
global reporting, which I never dreamed of experiencing as an
undergraduate," Roth said.
Natalie Hammer
Noblitt contributed to this report.
Article from the Princeton Alumni Weekly
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