Faced with threats to the funding of university Classics programmes and urgent calls to diversify and decolonise the subject, few would dispute this book's claim that Classics and its cognate academic disciplines stand at a crossroads. B.'s concise yet wide-ranging volume provides a timely and powerful statement on why globalising Classics can help to address these pressing challenges. Beginning with the goal of outlining the methods that comprise the recent ‘global turn’ in the study of the ancient world, the book swiftly moves beyond characterising the present state-of-the-art towards an inclusive manifesto of future directions, as contained in three chapters entitled ‘Transborder’, ‘Transhistorical’ and ‘Transdisciplinary’, and supplemented by an introduction and a short epilogue.
The extended introduction provides valuable scene-setting for those unfamiliar with the study of globalisation and the transdisciplinary field of global studies, and how these subjects have thus far impacted on Classics. Here and elsewhere in the book the value of globalisation thinking is highlighted in its capacity to decentre Eurocentric and occidentalist histories in favour of polycentric syntheses that emphasise diverse perspectives and voices. However, B.'s vision of global Classics goes beyond stating the need to historicise globalisation in an ancient setting. By giving equal weighting, for example, to the role of Classical Reception studies in scrutinising the real and imagined genealogical connections between what we call globalisations in the present and globalisations in antiquity, the mission of globalising Classics is an explicitly inclusive one, with relevance for all fields of the wider discipline. Global Classics is conceived as a multi-directional collaborative project that at once involves understanding the transformative role of connectivity and mobility from historical and archaeological perspectives, while researching the longer-term post-Classical lineages of texts, artefacts and ideas. In outlining this mission, B. conveys his firm belief that global Classics needs to produce new and important results of real societal relevance, as well as bringing about changes in the discipline that go above and beyond the status of popular trends in academia. Put simply, unless global Classics takes on a self-reflexive and critical stance, the discipline risks perpetuating its deeply problematic association with ‘Western’ cultural imperialism. This means, for example, countering popular stereotypical understandings of globalisation as (only) one-directional, homogenising and inherently about transnational market capitalism, providing alternatives to the privileging of elite perspectives in the study of Classical receptions (a field that B. considers internationalised, but not yet truly globalised), and re-situating hyper-specialised subjects like the study of the ancient Mediterranean (in B.'s view) in the context of renewed interdisciplinary dialogue and cross-period comparison.
Following the introduction's rousing call to arms on the need for something like ‘global Classics’, the following chapter ‘Transborder’ aims to outline the benefits of re-framing the study of antiquity in terms of globalisation thinking. Focusing on the importance of decentring historical analysis, this chapter provides a more detailed overview of how concepts of globalisation can bring novel perspectives to the ancient world. While those familiar with the unfolding debate may not find a great deal of novelty here, one of the chapter's main strengths is surely its synthesis of disparate approaches that cut across different periods and perspectives from the study of ancient literature, history and archaeology. Extended case studies on Polybius, whose writings have influenced social science approaches to globalisation since the early 1990s, and the site of Ai Khanoum (Afghanistan), used to dispel effectively the myth that (past) globalisations result in cultural homogeneity, are well chosen to illuminate the significance of existing dialogue between Classics and global studies as well as future possibilities.
Chapter 2, ‘Transhistorical’, shifts the book's attention from the spatial novelty of many recent approaches to the ancient world inspired by globalisation ideas, to the problematisation of temporal issues. The chapter begins with a critique of the dangers of existing historical periodisations, especially those deriving from the rise of political centralisation and military events, noting that such frameworks have limited meaning for the understanding of cultural practices that are often highly localised. While Classical Reception studies are praised for producing transhistorical and culturally diverse histories of ancient texts, as well as raising ethical questions over texts’ reproduction, circulation, meaning and access, B. reminds us of the risks of methodological nationalism, by continuing to place the ‘West’ at the centre of ‘global’ literary narratives. Indeed, this need to overcome methodological nationalism is equally valid if we are truly to globalise archaeological studies, especially for the kind of archaeology that tends to be practised within the confines of nation-state borders, leading to the reification of artificial boundaries of study that make little sense if we wish to understand the logics of dynamically connected entities like the Roman empire (e.g. Romano-British studies). Chapter 2, then, closes with the important reminder that globalising classical antiquity is not automatically or inherently an inclusive endeavour. Striving for narratives of both multiple globalisations and multiple antiquities ought to challenge researchers to make critical judgements when defining the temporal, spatial and human parameters of their research, and not just to perpetuate the status quo of (sometimes inherently colonised) past approaches.
The third chapter, ‘Transdisciplinary’, considers how to realise the book's vision of an inclusive and critical global Classics. Achieving this end in practical terms, B. argues, requires not only engagement with bodies of theory and methodology produced in other disciplines, but moreover, increased sub-disciplinary dialogue within Classics. On this subject B. is probably correct to identify the need for more conversations between researchers interested in history, archaeology, economics and anthropology on the one hand, and those concerned with art, literature, philosophy and reception on the other. Nevertheless, I would suggest that the origin of such a perceived divide owes more to the different kinds of study materials and research questions asked by scholars in these different fields, and is less a failure of dialogue within Classics (although this can certainly be improved). Another important desideratum outlined by B. is for the practitioners of global Classics to push for a more ethical stance that does more than look back at past cultures, to actively confront and even prevent some of the negative human and environmental effects of contemporary globalisation. This is a lofty goal that the book concedes may not always be possible for all Classics researchers to meet all the time, but it is certainly of utmost importance for the long-term future of the discipline.
Closing with a short epilogue that recapitulates a series of conceptual, methodological and ethical challenges raised in the book, Global Classics leaves the reader with much food for thought. B. has certainly succeeded in creating a new transdisciplinary vision that is at once optimistic, sustainable and compelling. It offers valuable critical perspectives on ‘globalising Classics’ for both newcomers to the field and seasoned trailblazers who may be less aware of the wider scope of research on the subject and indeed its relevance beyond more specialised lines of inquiry. Despite the slimness of the volume, what might have been lost, for example, from a more in-depth treatment of the burgeoning literature of specialised applications of globalisation thinking in Classics, is more than made up for by the book's refreshing take on the bigger picture and possible future directions of the discipline.
