Classical Studies Home Classical Studies Faculty Classical Studies Program Fall 2005 Classes News from Students and Alumni			Student Research In their senior year, every student, in close consultation with faculty, gets the chance to devise his or her own research project. Some recent senior projects: Rachel Standley (B.A. Classics, 2002), "Annotated Translation of Dionysios of Halikarnassos, De compositione verborum". Julie Sparks (B.A. Classics, 2001), "Icastic Ekphrasis in the Eikones of Lucian". Matt Schrumpf's (B.A. Classics and Religious Studies, magna cum laude, 2001) senior thesis in Classics discussed the process of translation and included his own translation and comparison of the three versions of Isaiah, chap. 7. Matt used a photo-reproduction of the famous Dead Sea Scrolls (this copy of Isaiah was written in ancient Hebrew around 150 BCE) and a photo-reproduction of the 896 CE Cairo Codex of Moshe ben Asher, also written in ancient Hebrew, as well as the compiled scholarly text of the Greek Septuagint. Kate McClendon (B.A.., Classics and Religious Studies, 2005), "Euripides' Bacchae and the Dionysiac Origins of Greek Tragedy." Carson Undergraduate Research Grants: An opportunity to do independant research and even get funded for it is provided by Willamette University's Carson Undergraduate Research Grants. Recent Classics major Julie Sparks (B.A., 2001) won one of these highly competitive grants for a project that explored the medieval techniques for producing illuminated manuscripts (see her wonderful project website at http://www.jcsparks.com/painted/index.html). Another recent winner, Andrew Bernhard (B.A., 1998), a Religious Studies major who studied four years of Classical and Hellenistic Greek at Willamette before the establishment of a formal Classical Studies Program, used his 1996 Carson Grant to write an original paper on The Acceptance of the Gospel of John into Normative Christianity. His investigation of early Christian literature introduced him to many unfamiliar texts and kindled his interest particularly in ancient gospels. This continuing passion led him to found a now wildly popular website, Gospel.net, that offers translations of all gospels written in the first two centuries as well as an ever-expanding, annotated bibliography of primary texts and photographs of ancient manuscripts. For more info on Andy, click here. Lilly Grants: Founded by a Lilly Grant, Kate McClendon (B.A.., Classics and Religious Studies, 2005) was able to explore shamanic influences on Asian and Hellenistic Greek religions by visiting a number of libraries and art museums all across the country. In the resulting paper, entitled "Journey of the Spirit: Shamanic Influences on Silk Road Religions", she argues that not only goods were exchanged along the vast geographic and cultural expanses linked by the Silk Road but also religious ideas and philosophies. In particular, she examines texts and art found along the Silk Road that demonstrate that the major religions of the area (Buddhism, Zoroastrism, Gnosticism, and Hellenistic religions) interacted with each other and shared common shamanic characteristics.