Emeritus Professor Elizabeth Minchin
Areas of expertise
- Latin And Classical Greek Literature 200510
- Language Studies 2003
- Latin And Classical Greek Languages 200305
- Literary Studies 2005
Research interests
My research focuses on the Homeric epics as oral poetry: the composition of the Homeric epics;
Homer and memory; Homer's narrative; the speech Homer attributes to his characters; the reception of the Homeric epics through time. As a member of the ARC-funded ANU-University of Melbourne 2010 Gallipoli Project I developed a strong research interest in social memory and the landscape of the Dardanelles region, which I am directing to new projects on myth and memory and landscape within that region, and their reception.
Biography
My first career after graduating from Sydney University was as a secondary school teacher of
languages ancient and modern. I subsequently completed an MA and PhD at the Australian
National University in Ancient Greek literature (my PhD thesis was a study of the role that
memory played in the composition of the Homeric epics) and joined the Classics staff in the
Classics Program (now the Centre for Classical Studies) at the ANU. Teaching the languages and literature of Ancient Greece and
Rome--that is, helping students to appreciate why the literature of these ancient cultures
continues to be so influential--is what drives me. I have also enjoyed teaching classes in social history. The awards I have won for the quality of my
teaching reflect my commitment to doing this well.
Researcher's projects
1. Troy, landscape and memory
2. The legend of Hero and Leander on the Hellespont and its transmission through time
3. Heritage in the landscape: the so-called heroic tumuli in the Troad
4. 'Translation' and Transformation: Alice Oswald's Excavation of the Iliad
5. The Odyssey after the Iliad: ties that bind
6. Repetition in Homeric epics: cognitive and linguistic perspectives
7. Homer and the stewardship of memory
Current student projects
Aspects of hospitality in the Homeric epics (PhD)
Similes in the Odyssey (incoming MPhil)
Past student projects
Many studies of the Homeric epics
Babrius and Aesopian fables
Tragic props and cognitive function (ancient drama)
Minoan iconography
The rose in Greek and Latin literature
Horace on ancient travel
Medicina domestica: medicina and power in the non-urban Roman household
The judgment of Paris ain art and literature
Publications
- Minchin, E 2017, 'Voice and Voices: Homer and the Stewardship of Memory', in Niall W Slater (ed.), Voice and Voices in Antiquity: Orality and Literacy in the Ancient World, vol 11, Brill, Leiden and Boston, pp. 11-30.
- Minchin, E & Jackson, H, eds, 2017, Text and the Material World: Essays in Honour of Graeme Clarke, Astrom Editions, Uppsala, Sweden.
- Minchin, E 2016, 'Heritage in the Landscape: The 'Heroic Tumuli' in the Troad Region', in Jeremy McInerney and Ineke Sluiter (ed.), Valuing Landscape in Classical Antiquity: Natural Environment and Cultural Imagination, Koninklijke Brill, Leiden and Boston, pp. 255-275.
- Grieve, J & Minchin, E 2016, 'Andre Tchernia, The Romans and Trade, Oxford Studies on the Roman Economy, Oxford University Press, 2016, xiii, 379 pp (translated by James Grieve, with Elizabeth Minchin, from Les Romains et le commerce, Naples, 2011)'.
- Minchin, E 2016, 'Repetition in Homeric Epic: Cognitive and Linguistic Perspectives', in Mihailo Antovic and Christobal Pagan Canovas (ed.), Oral Poetics and Cognitive Science, Walter de Gruyter and Co., Berlin Germany, pp. 12-29.
- Minchin, E 2015, ''Translation' and Transformation: Alice Oswald's Excavation of the Iliad', Classical Receptions Journal, vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 202-222.
- Minchin, E 2015, 'Remembering Leander: The Long History of the Dardanelles Swim', Classical Receptions Journal, vol. early online version, p. 18.
- Minchin, E 2014, 'Shedding New Light on the Ancient Mediterranean World: The ANU Classics Collection', TAASA Review: Journal of the Asian Art Society of Australia, vol. 23, no. 2, June 2014, pp. 20-21.
- Minchin, E 2014, 'Poet, Audience, Time, and Text: Reflections on Medium and Mode in Homer and Virgil', in Ruth Scodel (ed.), Between Orality and Literacy: Communication and Adaptation in Antiquity: Orality and Literacy in the Ancient World, Koninklijke Brill, Leiden and Boston, pp. 267-288.
- Minchin, E & Pomeroy, A, eds, 2014, Antichthon: Journal of the Australasian Society for Classical Studies, volume 48.
- Burton, P, Pomeroy, A, Minchin, E et al, eds, 2013, Culture, Identity and Politics in the Ancient Mediterranean World: Papers from a Conference in Honour of Erich Gruen.
- Minchin, E 2012, 'Commemoration and pilgrimage in the ancient world: Troy and the stratigraphy of cultural memory', Greece and Rome, vol. 59, no. 1, pp. 76-89.
- Minchin, E 2012, 'Introduction [to Orality, Literacy and Performance in the Ancient World]', in Elizabeth Minchin (ed.), Orality, Literacy and Performance in the Ancient World, Koninklijke Brill, Leiden, The Netherlands, pp. xi-xviii.
- Minchin, E, ed., 2012, Orality, Literacy and Performance in the Ancient World, Koninklijke Brill, Leiden, The Netherlands.
- Minchin, E 2012, 'Memory and Memories: Personal, Social, and Cultural Memory in the Poems of Homer', in Franco Montanari, Antonios Rengakos, Christos Tsagalis (eds), Homeric Contexts Neoanalysis and the Interpretation of Oral Poetry, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin, Germany and Boston, USA, pp. 83-99.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Ring Composition', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, p. 751.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Nestor', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 571-572.
- Minchin, E 2011, ''Themes' and 'Mental Moulds': Roger Schank, Malcolm Willcock and the Creation of Character in Homer', The Classical Quarterly, vol. 61, no. 2, pp. 323-343.
- Minchin, E & Davis, P, eds, 2011, Antichthon.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Speech-Act Theory', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 817-818.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Arming-Scenes', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, p. 97.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Catalogues', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 155-156.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Memory', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 505-506.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Speech Introductions', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 818-819.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'Andromache', in Margalit Finkelberg (ed.), The Homer Encyclopaedia, Wiley-Blackwell, Sussex, UK, pp. 53-54.
- Minchin, E 2011, 'The Words of Gods: Divine Discourse in Homer's Iliad', in APMH Lardinois, JH Blok & MGM Van Der Poel (ed.), Sacred Words: Orality, Literacy and Religion, Koninklijke Brill, The Netherlands, pp. 17-35.
- Minchin, E 2010, 'From gentle teasing to heavy sarcasm: Instances of rhetorical irony in Homer's Iliad', Hermes: Zeitschrift fuer klassische Philologie, vol. 138, no. 4, pp. 387-402.
- Minchin, E & Davis, P, eds, 2010, Antichthon.
- Minchin, E 2010, 'The expression of sarcasm in the Odyssey', Mnemosyne, vol. 63, no. 4, pp. 533-556.
- Minchin, E & Davis, P, eds, 2008, Antichthon.
- Minchin, E 2009, 'Communication without words: Body Language, 'Pictureability' and Memorability in the Iliad', Ordia Prima, vol. 7 (2008), no. 2009, pp. 17-38.
- Minchin, E 2008, 'Can one ever forget? Homer on the persistence of painful memories', Scholia, vol. 15, pp. 2-16.
- Minchin, E 2008, 'Spatial Memory and the Composition of the Iliad', in E Anne Mackay (ed.), Orality, Literacy, Memory in the Ancient Greek and Roman World, Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden, The Netherlands, pp. 9-34.
- Minchin, E 2007, 'Men's Talk and Women's Talk in Homer: Rebukes and Protests', Mediterranean Archaeology, vol. 19/20, pp. 213-224.
- Minchin, E 2007, Homeric Voices: Discourse, Memory, Gender, Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK.
- Minchin, E 2007, 'The Language of Heroes and the Language of Heroines: storytelling in oral traditional epic', in Craig Cooper (ed.), Politics of Orality, Koninklijke Brill, Netherlands, pp. 3-38.
- Minchin, E 2005, 'Homer on autobiographical memory: the case of Nestor', in Robert J. Rabel (ed.), Approaches to Homer: Ancient and Modern, Classical Press of Wales, Swansea, UK, pp. 55-72.
- Minchin, E 2004, 'Rhythm and regularity in Homeric composition', in C J Mackie (ed.), Oral Performance and Its Context, Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden, pp. 21-48.
- Minchin, E 2002, 'Verbal Behaviour in its Social Context: Three Question Strategies in Homer's Odyssey', The Classical Quarterly, vol. 52, no. 1, pp. 15-32.
- Minchin, E 2002, 'Speech Acts in the Everyday World and in Homer: The Rebuke as a Case Study', in Ian Worthington and John Miles Foley (ed.), Epea and Grammata: Oral and Written Communication in Ancient Greece, Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden, pp. 71-97.
- Minchin, E 2001, 'Homere', European Legacy, The, vol. 6, no. 5, pp. 679-680.
- Minchin, E 2001, 'Similes in Homer: Image, Minds Eye, and Memory', in Watson, Janet (ed.), Speaking Volumes: Orality and Literacy in the Greek and Roman World, Brill Academic Publishers, Leiden.Boston.Koln, pp. 25-52.
- Minchin, E 2001, Homer and the Resources of Memory: Some Applications of Cognitive Theory to the Iliad and the Odyssey, Oxford University Press, New York USA.
- Minchin, E 2001, 'How Homeric is Hysteron Proteron?', Mnemosyne, vol. 54, pp. 635-645.
- Minchin, E 2001, 'On Declining an Invitation in Homer and in Everyday Talk: Context, Form and Function', Antichthon, vol. 35, pp. 1-19.
- Minchin, E 1999, 'Homer and the Art of Storytelling', Omnibus, no. January, pp. 1-3.
Projects and Grants
Grants are drawn from ARIES. To add Projects or Grants please contact your College Research Office.
- The silent wilderness speaks: the long history of Gallipoli and the Dardanelles (Secondary Investigator)
