OUC lecture on Christianity’s impact on Roman comedy

Τhe “Studies in Hellenic Culture” programme of the Open University of Cyprus (OUC) is organising the Fifth Cycle of the Lecture Series in Late Antiquity, titled: “When our world became Christian”.

The upcoming fourth lecture of the Series is entitled “What will you lose if I laugh?’: Comedic Shows, Urbanity and Christianization in Late Antiquity”, and the invited speaker is Dr. Richard Lim, Professor of History at Smith College in Massachusetts, USA.

The online event will be held on Thursday, March 28, 2024, 7pm (GMT+2), and will be broadcast live via OUC’s eLearning Platform (eClass) at the following link: https://shorturl.at/kBIOW. Convenor of the Lecture Series is Associate Professor Georgios Deligiannakis, Programme “Studies in Hellenic Culture”. The Series is supported by the Student and Alumni Union of the Programme and the Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation.

The lecture will cover: what roles did comedic shows continue to play in Roman society with the rise of Christianity in Late Antiquity? Why were they opposed by some Christians when, at first sight, the art of making people laugh appears less likely than gladiatorial combat, chariot races and pantomimic dances to offend the religious? In this lecture, Prof. Lim will explore the nature of comedic theatre and performances by mimes in particular, their reception by various segments of the Late Roman population, and what this tells us in terms of the relationship between Christianisation and Roman urban culture.

Richard Lim is Professor of History at Smith College in Massachusetts, USA. He studied at the University of California at Berkeley and Princeton University. His dissertation was on Public Disputation, Power and Social Order in Late Antiquity.

Besides the social and cultural history of philosophical and religious debates in Late Antiquity, he has been investigating aspects of the historical encounters between Christianity and the Roman public spectacles of the theatre, amphitheatre and hippodrome, including how they gave rise to the category of ‘secular’.

Recent works include an article on “Talk of the Town”: Sociability, the Culture of Spectacles and Religiosity in Roman and Late Roman Metropolitan Cities”, and, with Asuman Lätzer-Lasar, a chapter on “The Festive City” for the Cambridge Urban History of Europe. His work has also followed the recent “Eurasian turn” in Late Antique studies, and he is currently completing a project on “The First Official Contact between Rome and China?: a Roman Embassy to the Han Emperor’s Court in A.D. 166”.

Register for the event at: https://forms.office.com/e/RTfi7Fd8Kn