Digitizing Ancient and Modern Refugees: Classics and Community Engaged Scholarship in the Classroom

Fall Conference

California State University at Long Beach Departments of Classics, History and Comparative World Literature and California Classical Association - South

This talk discusses a new course I am teaching at UCLA that leverages digital humanities tools to explore the concept of “refugees” in ancient and modern contexts, with a focus on the Greco-Roman world and the contemporary Vietnamese diaspora. Students examine the ways that refugees have been discussed, portrayed, and treated, as well as flip the script to explore refugeehood through the perspectives and experiences of refugees themselves. Students have the opportunity to engage with real refugee artifacts from our community partner, the Vietnamese Heritage Museum, located in Westminster, CA, as they work towards digitally preserving a selection of the museum’s collection. For the final project, students are tasked with curating digital exhibits that feature refugee material culture from the contemporary Vietnamese diaspora alongside those from the ancient Greco-Roman world in ways that shed light on contemporary refugee issues. By contributing to a community digital archive and creating rotating virtual exhibits, the course extends educational resources beyond the university and contributes to ongoing public discussions about cultural heritage and refugee/human rights.