Arcadia
University
Arcadia
University
Arcadia Center for Hellenic, Mediterranean and Balkan Studies
Athens, Greece
Disclaimer: The following description of the Arcadia University Program represents my personal opinion; it should not be construed to represent official Trinity College views or endorsement
Arcadia University occupies two floors of a charming building in the Pangrati section of Athens, just off Varnava Plateia ("Square"). The neighborhood presents a typical Athenian mixture of residential apartments (on upper floors) and shops, restaurants, and businesses on street level. By Athenian standards the neighborhood is quiet and a bit out-of-the-way; but in fact it lies within easy walking or bus ride distance of the main attractions of Athens -- the Plaka, the Akropolis, and the chief shopping districts.
Arcadia University (formerly Beaver College) serves a small clientele -- typically about 20-25 students per semester.
Curriculum.
Arcadia
offers a curriculum well-balanced between ancient, Byzantine, and modern Greek
studies. During the current (spring 2004) semester, students had a choice of 13
classes (excluding language classes, treated separately below). Of these, 5 were
in Greek antiquity, 3 in the Byzantine period, and 5 in the modern period.
Within each period, the spread of classes is good. For the ancient period,
students could choose from courses on: the sites and monuments of Athens;
tragedy; prehistoric Aegean archaeology; philosophy; and Greek religion. In the
Byzantine period, the three courses cover general history, religion, and the
cult of Mary. The five modern courses include the history of the modern Greek
state; Greece's relations with the European union; modern Greek literature; the
ethnography of Athens; and conservation in modern Greece.
Students majoring in Classics obviously will find much to their taste at Arcadia, but there are also classes that could appeal to majors in history, political science, international studies, anthropology, and environmental sciences.
One caveat for Classics majors – Latin seems not to be regularly available. If you are a Classics major, you'll need to plan (consult your advisor here and email the director of Arcadia).
Arcadia takes considerable advantage of its presence in Athens. One expects such programs to teach on-site – the monuments of antiquity and the museums are right there; it would be crazy not to exploit them. But the modern courses also exploit the environment – the ethnography course has almost weekly field trips to places both expected and quirky; the modern Greek history course visits the Greek parliament and a warship museum; the conservation course has deep ties with the sea turtle conservation organization in Greece. Finally, Arcadia also organizes, through the courses, several field trips across the semester (set up in such a way that students do not miss other course work).
A new component of the curriculum is the "Greek Key" seminar, obligatory for all students. "Greek Key," taught by the program director, aims to get students involved as directly as possible with Greeks and in Athens through the mechanism of service learning. Each student or group of two or three students is matched up with an organization in Athens where they volunteer a few hours a week. The organizations range from church-run soup kitchens for immigrants to AIDS organizations to a non-profit devoted to protecting endangered Greek sea turtles. Students report back on their experiences to the group and compare and contrast them. This approach is a conscious effort by the director to compensate for the disadvantages of the "island" setting of the program (see below under Housing) and the fact that penetrating Greek culture can be difficult, especially for students who stay only a semester (more on this below).
Modern Greek. Students
studying at Arcadia are required to take modern Greek. The focus in the classes
is not on formal, systematic language instruction in grammar, syntax, and
vocabulary, but rather the acquisition of a basic functional knowledge -- Greek
enough to negotiate the streets, order in restaurants, deal with shopkeepers,
and have basic interactions with people. Those who come with some Greek
(typically Greek-Americans who spoke Greek at home) and, in the second semester,
students who stay a full year, are placed in higher-level classes in which
language instruction takes on more formal characteristics.
Housing. Arcadia is an "island program" in study-abroad jargon -- meaning that students live neither in dorms nor with local families, but in apartments rented by the program. (Greek culture makes finding host families virtually impossible -- it simply does not fit in Greek concepts of the family to bring in an outsider for a semester.) As part of Arcadia's commitment to get students as involved in Athenian life as possible, the apartments -- which house two to five students -- are spread out, some in Pankrati, some in Kolonaki -- all within walking distance of the Center, but far enough apart that students have to make plans to interact.
Integration into Athenian life. Arcadia staff is well aware of the difficulties students often encounter in finding footing in Athenian life. The language presents one barrier (though not an insurmountable one), Greek social practices another. Since this program serves only American students, contact with Greeks through formal classroom channels is non-existent. Most Greeks of college age live at home with their parents and belong to a "parea," a group of friends, which formed when they were children; they feel no need to make new friends, and foreign students often find it almost impossible to break into such groups. The service learning component of the program was designed explicitly to help address some of these problems, as noted above. Island living promotes a certain degree of integration -- students must deal with their neighbors, buy food, etc. But the staff admits that the challenges of entering into Athenian life are difficult, and the resources available to Arcadia to answer them limited. Much depends on the resourcefulness and persistence of the students themselves, on a willingness to take social risks and not settle for the security of hanging out with the other students in the program.
Who should consider Arcadia?
The small number of students gives Arcadia an intimacy that bigger programs
lack. Students call their teachers by their first names, and students and
teachers often share social life -- eating out together or going to hear music.
The program affords considerable latitude for personal attention and small
classes. For students who like service learning, Arcadia is the obvious choice.
In general, Arcadia's program is designed to push students into Athenian life through
obligatory language classes focused on immediate practicality, the service
learning component, and the scattered-site housing.
In the past, programs in Athens have tended to attract students interested in ancient Greece -- Classics majors and, to a lesser degree, History and Philosophy majors. But Arcadia recognizes that Greece has a fascinating post-classical history and that modern Greek culture is a legitimate and compelling subject for study. Thus its curriculum now includes many courses that have nothing to do with the deep classical past. This change should make Arcadia appealing to students in a much wider range of disciplines. Moreover, Greece, though European, is not the UK -- it is a genuinely different place, though rapidly becoming more "European." Any student who is looking for a richer, different kind of experience abroad but who is attracted to Europe should seriously consider Arcadia.
For more information. Explore the links below to find out more about Arcadia, or contact me or other Trinity faculty who have some experience in Greece. For details about study abroad, and to plan your semester(s), see the Office of International Programs at Trinity: (860) 297-2005.
Contacts:
In the US, for information and application materials, contact the Northeastern US representative:
P.O. Box 268
Hanover, NH 03755
Telephone: 267-218-0218
Fax: 775-269-0107
In Greece, contact:
Resident Director,
Arcadia Center for Hellenic, Mediterranean and Balkan Studies
Embedokleus 26
11636 Athens, Greece
Telephone: 001-30-210-75-25-318
Fax: 001-30-210-70-18-495
Web Site: Arcadia University