Affective Animation: How Disney Pixar Movies Make Us Cry

‘Did Up make you cry?’ is basically a rhetorical question. Whether it is a story about toys, robots, animals, monsters, or humans, Disney Pixar is amazingly good in leaving you in tears at the end of the movie. How does Pixar manage to make even adults cry their eyes out for animated characters?

Leonie Henkes • March 17, 2022

Çiğ Köfte and Rosé Wine: Neo-Arabesk Mashups, Guilty Pleasure, and Play

Arabesk music ‘portrays a world of complex and turbulent emotions peopled by lovers doomed to solitude and a violent end’. Saniye Ince reflects on guilty pleasure and play, exploring neo-arabesk, a contemporary Turkish music genre, and its ties to the country’s food culture.

Saniye Ince • March 03, 2022

The Aesthetics of Contemporary Animation: Melding 2D & 3D Techniques

Since the first Toy Story (1995) much modern animation has been created utilising 3D techniques. In this blog, Miguel Mira explores how two recent animations, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) and Arcane (2021), utilise both 2D and 3D capabilities to generate a new aesthetic sensibility.

Miguel Mira • February 17, 2022

Beowulf vs. Grettir: the 11th-century hero showdown you did need

We have all seen the Avengers, so we know who the strongest one is. But what about the heroes of old? What would happen if, let’s say, Beowulf, the great Geat warrior would have to fight against Grettir the Strong? What happens when Anglo-Saxon epic clashes against Icelandic sagas? Read to find out!

Martina Marzullo • January 27, 2022

Whose words are they, anyway? Visiting 'Elizabeth and Mary: Royal Cousins, Rival Queens'

In this blog, Clodagh Murphy reflects on her recent visit to "Elizabeth and Mary: Royal Cousins, Rival Queens" at the British Library. The first exhibition to consider both queens jointly, "Elizabeth and Mary" tells their remarkable story through the queens’ ‘own words’.

Clodagh Murphy • January 20, 2022

Over my Dead Sheep’s Body!

As long as there have been taxes, people have tried to avoid them. Bob van Velthoven shows what a case of English window tax and an Ancient Greek anecdote can teach us about the preoccupation with paying as little tax as possible, and gives some tips on how to avoid taxes yourself this Christmas.

Bob van Velthoven • December 23, 2021

Make it New but Make it Old! Anchoring Innovation in Second-Century Celebrity Culture, Taylor Swift, and The Beatles

Modern artists are concerned with originality, while art in Antiquity was devoted to imitation, right? At least, that is how the story is often told. By looking at ancient and modern pop stars, this blog post shows that imitation and originality are not as irreconcilable as you would think.

Bram Demulder • December 09, 2021

Of Classics and Curricular Cobwebs: Towards the Development of Interdisciplinary Teaching in Dutch Gymnasia

One would expect interdisciplinary learning to be an essential component of the curricula in secondary schools in The Netherlands. Unfortunately, according to latest reports, it is not. In this blog post, Sandra Karten explains the advantages and challenges of interdisciplinary teaching.

Sandra Karten • November 24, 2021

Stoic Sage vs. Homo Economicus: the Battle for the Ages or…not?

Do Stoic ideas present an alternative to modern economic thinking? In this blog post, Aiste Celkyte explores the differences and surprising similarities between the Stoic sage and the homo economicus.

Aiste Celkyte • November 11, 2021