Greek Tragedy in the Community
In collaboration with Maynard Adams Fellow Kari Lindquist and the Department of Classics at UNC-CH, the Parr Center for Ethics is excited to offer on campus- and community-based programming around ancient tragedy. This unique project includes reading groups and community offerings to supplement performances by exploring the themes in each play.
Our Aims
- to create an intergenerational space for community members to grapple with life’s moral tensions
- to ask questions that are grounded in the richness and lived experience of folks across the lifespan
- to confront a world that is riddled with injustice, vulnerability, and loss
About
Spring 2025: Homer’s “Odyssey”
Past Events
2024: Euripides’ “Alcestis”
On April 8, 2024, an intergenerational group affiliated with the Parr Center’s Outreach Program, in partnership with the UNC Departments of Music and Classics, performed a stage reading of Euripides’ Alcestis. An audience dialogue followed the performance. It explored the play’s philosophical and existential themes—death & afterlife, hospitality & friendship, love & betrayal, gender, and social expectations.
Pre-Show Programming
Engagement Week Reading Group: A community reading group was held at Chapel Hill Public Library on February 28, 2024 as a part of Carolina Engagement Week. Participants were gifted copies the play.
Flyleaf Lecture and Discussion: The UNC Classics Department and the Philosophy Department hosted a lecture at Flyleaf Books, facilitated by UNC Professor Al Duncan (Classics) on March 4, 2024. Participants were gifted copies the play.
Coffee with Alcestis: A community reading group comprised of UNC students, staff, and faculty of all backgrounds met twice in March, 2024 to read each half of Euripides’ play.
Classroom Visits in Chapel-Hill Durham: UNC Teaching Assistant Professor of Philosophy Michael Vazquez and Maynard Adams Fellow Kari Lindquist lead a session about Alcestis at Excelsior Classical Academy in Durham on April 23, 2024.
2023: Seneca’s “Medea”
On March 27, 2023, an intergenerational group affiliated with the Parr Center’s Outreach Program performed a stage reading of Seneca’s Medea. This was in partnership with the UNC Departments of Philosophy and Classics, and with support from the Society for Classical Studies, Humanities for the Public Good, Carolina Public Humanities, and the Department of Music. An audience dialogue followed the performance. It explored the play’s philosophical and literary themes, such as how to confront a world that is riddled with contradiction, vulnerability, and loss.
Pre-Show Programming
Flyleaf Lecture and Discussion: The UNC Classics Department and the Philosophy Department hosted a two-part lecture series at Flyleaf Books, facilitated by UNC Professor Al Duncan (Classics) on February 20 and March 6, 2023. Participants were gifted copies the play.
Coffee with Medea: A community reading group comprised of UNC students, staff, and faculty of all backgrounds met twice in March, 2023 to read each half of Seneca’s play.
Rehearsal at Carolina Meadows: The performance team, led by Kari Lindquist (UNC Music) and Michael Vazquez (UNC Philosophy), conducted a full rehearsal at Carolina Meadows Retirement Community, a longtime partner of the UNC Philosophy Department.
Planning Team
Kari Lindquist // Performance Conductor
Kari Lindquist (Ph.D. Candidate) holds an MA in Humanities from the University of Chicago with an interdisciplinary focus on Music History and English and a double BA in Comparative Literature and Arts & Ideas in the Humanities from the University of Michigan. Her dissertation explores tours of U.S. wind bands in Cold War musical diplomacy. She uses archival materials and interviews to reconstruct individual musicians’ sonic experiences and encounters in public spaces. She served as a fellow with Carolina Performing Arts as part of Humanities for the Public Good at UNC from 2021-2022 and currently holds a Maynard Adams Fellowship for the Public Humanities.
Michael Vazquez, Ph.D. // Philosophy Content & Community Programming
Michael Vazquez is a Teaching Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Director of Outreach at the Parr Center for Ethics. He received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania and specializes in ancient philosophy and the philosophy of education. He is committed to forging lasting, democratic, and collaborative partnerships between the academy and the community, and to cultivating the philosophical voices of people of all ages.
Al Duncan, Ph.D. // Classics Content
Al Duncan’s research considers the ways audiences, ancient and modern, perceive and value ancient Greek and Roman theater. Considering plays not simply as poetic texts but also as scripts for performance, his work focuses on the production, materiality, and aesthetics of the dramas of Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aristophanes. In his soon to be published book, Ugly Productions: An Aesthetics of Greek Drama, Duncan explores the ways ugliness established and mediated genre in the nascent art form of theater. His forthcoming and in-progress work explores cognitive aspects of dramatic production and reception as well as distributed authorship in ancient literature.
Alex Richardson, Ph.D. // Creative Consultant
Alex Richardson has been Director of the National High School Ethics Bowl since 2019. A philosopher working at the intersections of ethics, political philosophy, and the philosophy of education, Alex is an award-winning teacher and an advocate for public and pre-college philosophy pedagogy. His research interests are varied, but as of late concern issues in moral and civic education. He received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2021, where he wrote a dissertation on the liberal virtue of civility and its role in the non-ideal politics of democratic societies like our own.
Ways to Volunteer
Performance
All are invited and welcome to attend our free, public performance events!
Event Support
The performances are logistical feats, and we’re always looking for folks who might wish to serve as ushers, to answer attendee questions, and to participate earnestly in the discussion to follow the staged reading (including possibly co-facilitating small group discussions).
Promotion & Recruitment
We want these to continue to be multi-generational community-facing events, so we try to cast a wide net with event promotion. We can always use help putting up posters around town, interfacing with local organizations, and more generally with spreading the word both on and off campus.
We are grateful to our sponsors
Questions? Contact karil@unc.edu or michael.vazquez@unc.edu