Here are some of the topics that students have put forward in their proposals for their position papers in this course over the past few years. Some are general directions, while others are specific questions of the kind you will need as the basis for your proposal.

If you’re stuck for a topic, browse through the categories and think about what ideas and questions you might be interested in exploring, finding evidence, and expressing your own thoughts and interpretations. Use these past topics as guides in formulating a problem or debate on which you can take a position in your paper, or as inspiration for a new topic no one has explored before.

Comparing Gender Roles in Different Cultures

Comparing Spartan women with Roman women
A comparison of Spartan and Egyptian women
Contrasting prominent women
Did women in ancient Egypt experience more social, legal, and economic freedoms than women in ancient Greece and Rome?
First women: Eve and Pandora
Greek and Egyptian women
Greek women vs. Roman women
Parallels in life cycle traditions between Hellenic and diasporan Jewish society
Status of women in Ancient Egypt vs. Ancient Greece
Was living as an Egyptian woman better than living as a woman in other nations?
Women in Greece and Egypt

Gender in Athens

Athenian women as empowered
The exclusion of women in ancient Athens
Female agency within the family structure in Athens
Hetairai vs. Athenian Women
LGBTQ community in Ancient Athens
Were hetaira women more free than married women in nobles’ families in ancient Athens?
Women in the Athenian polis

Gender in Sparta

Gender roles in ancient Greece: A deeper look into social orders in Sparta
The life of a Spartan woman
The “liberated” Spartan women
Spartan women
Spartan women: control and expectation
Women’s identity and Spartan women

Gender in Athens vs. Sparta

Ancient Greece’s Women: Athenians and Spartans
The double standard of female sexuality in ancient Greece
Gender and Freedom in Ancient Greece: Sparta vs. Athens
Gender and Power in Ancient Athens vs. Sparta
Gender expectations in Sparta and Athens
Greek attitudes about sexual behavior: benefits for women and men
The Greek family in history and myth
Greek women were seen in terms of how they benefitted men
Oppressed ancient women in Greece
The relationship between male and female aspects in ancient Greece
Spartan vs Athenian women
Spartan vs Athenian women: Which society gave women more power?
Womanhood in Ancient Greece
Women in Ancient Greece Oppression or Hidden Influence?

Gender in Egypt

The competence of Hatshepsut
Female leadership in New Kingdom Egypt
Hatshepsut’s legitimacy
Hatshepsut as a fluke
How valid is the Egyptian reputation with regard to gender equality
Roman Accounts of Cleopatra
Women as Pharaohs in Egypt

Gender in Rome

Economic Influence and Gendered Limits: How Roman Elite and Freedwomen Upheld the Paterfamilias System
Gender in the Twelve Tables
Homosexuality in Rome
Mother and son relationships among the Romans
The rape and suicide of Lucretia
Women in Roman society
Zenobia and the Romans

Gender in Sumer

Power of women in Epic of Gilgamesh
Women in The Epic of Gilgamesh

Gender in Judea

The choices of Ruth
Exclusion in Israel
Gender in relation to Jewish religion
Jewish women in antiquity
Monotheism and Jewish women
Representation of women in the Bible
Sarah and the Sacrifice of Isaac
Vashti and Esther
Women and the Kingdom of Israel
Women in Jewish literature
Women in the Hebrew Community
Women in the Old Testament

Literature and Legend: Pandora and Medusa

Depictions of Medusa
Eat the fruit, break the world: the price of female curiosity
Is Pandora to be blamed for the evil and misery released into the world?
The symbolism of Medusa
Pandora’s guilt
Hesiod’s version of Pandora
Why does Greek mythology transform Medusa, a victim of violence, into a monstrous figure whose power must be destroyed?

Literature and Legend: Greek

Characterizations of female characters as a means of reinforcing gender expectations
Crafty Penelope
Did Helen of Troy cause the Trojan War?
Depictions of women as inferior in Homer and Hesiod
Euripides’s Medea: Is Medea’s character a victim of patriarchal oppression or a threat to the patriarchy?
Gender in Theogony
Gender roles in Bacchae
Hesiod’s viewpoint on gender
How does Hesiod portray women in his works and how does that reflect greater Greek beliefs?
Is Helen more noble than Andromache?
Portrayals of gender roles in Greek legend
Representation of women in Greek literature
The romanticism of the imagery in Sappho
Treatment of women in Homer
Women in Herodotos
Women in Homer

Literature and Legend: Other Cultures

Characterization of Ancient Irish women
Enkidu’s influence on Gilgamesh
If women were truly powerless, why do ancient sources highlight their intelligence, decision-making, and responsibilities?
Portrayal of masculine women
Representations of powerful women

Philosophy

Did ancient philosophers support the traditional gender roles or challenge the dominance of women?

Gender and war

The extent of women’s roles in times of war
Warfare determined women’s freedoms and privileges in the ancient world
What roles did women play in the strategy of war?

Female Social Participation

The female burden
Female agency and fear
Female agency in ancient decision-making
Female is to nature vs. male is to culture
The gender divide as a result of males feeling threatened
Men in the ancient era assert superiority based on fear of women
Unrecognized influence of women
Why women weren’t treated equally in the ancient world
Women as a catalyst for change
Women in the public sector
Women’s Powers in Antiquity

Gods and Goddesses

Aphrodite and morality
Are Greek goddesses actually powerful or just controlled by men?
Athena and her seeming lack of femininity
Athena’s dual-genderedness
Demeter and Kore
Divine gender roles in Greek mythology
Female sexuality in Ancient Greece through gods and goddesses
Gender expectations: Goddesses and mortal women
Goddesses in the Roman religion
Greek goddesses and their relation to mortal women
Greek gods and nonconsensual sex
Greek mythology and patriarchal norms
Monogamy among gods and goddesses
Mortals vs. immortals
Relative power of the Greek gods
Virtue, gods, and mortals
Women in mythology
Women’s role in ancient religion