Online Courses in Ancient Greek
Affordable college classes taught by Randolph College’s nationally-ranked faculty
Ancient Greek
Sessions for 2024-2025 Academic Year
Fall A: Aug 22 – Oct 11, 2024
Fall B: Oct 21 – Dec 13, 2024
Spring A: Jan 16 – Mar 7, 2025
Spring B: Mar 17 – May 6, 2025
Summer A: May 26 – Jul 1, 2025
Summer B: Jul 14 – Aug 15, 2025
Tuition & Fees
Tuition: $375 per credit hour
Costs for textbooks and other course materials vary. These resources can be purchased separately from the source of your choosing.
Learn At Your Own PaceTake traditional courses or spread out modular courses over time.
With our course module options you can take a single 4-credit course as 4 sequential modules of 1 credit each.
The courses are asynchronus and you can choose to enroll in as many modules as you want to complete in a 5-week session.
Elementary Ancient Greek Modules
- GREK 1111, GREK 1112, GREK 1113, GREK 1114 = 4 credit hours
- GREK 1121, GREK 1122, GREK 1123, GREK 1124 = 4 credit hours
Intermediate Greek – New Testament Modules
- GREK 2211, GREK 2212, GREK 2213, GREK 2214 = 4 credit hours
Summer Intensive
We offer beginning ancient Greek online in two five-week, 4-credit classes, Greek 1101 and Greek 1102.
- GREK 1101: Elementary Ancient Greek. 4 credit hours
- GREK 1102: Elementary Ancient Greek. 4 credit hours
Elementary Ancient GreekGREK 1101, GREK 1102, GREK 1111-1114, GREK 1121-1124
An intensive introduction to classical Greek, with emphasis on basic grammar and syntax. Reading of simple prose and poetry. Classical Greek is also excellent preparation for Homeric and biblical Greek.
Our objective in these courses is to gain a fundamental and detailed understanding of Greek grammar and syntax in order to achieve beginning reading comprehension of works in Greek. Please note that we are not learning conversational Ancient Greek; our task, rather, is to take the first steps towards reading and understanding the language of Sophocles, Plato, Sappho, Demosthenes, and the New Testament.
Textbook: Greek: An Intensive Course by Hardy Hansen and Gerald Quinn.
ISBN: 9780823216635
Software: Students will need to enable the Polytonic Greek keyboard on their computers, which comes standard on both Mac and Windows operating systems.
Intermediate Greek - New TestamentGREK 2211-2214
Students read an unabridged book of the New Testament in ancient Greek.
Coursework will include review of basic grammar and syntax and introductions to the variations of Greek style.
While students must work through the modules in order, they may enroll in multiple modules simultaneously to learn Hebrew at the speed appropriate for them.
Emphasis is on grammar and syntax with reading of simple passages. The course is offered primarily online and asynchronously.
Your Instructor
Amy R. CohenCatherine Ehrman Thoresen '23 and William E. Thoresen Professor of Speech and Theatre, Professor of Classics
B.A., Yale University; Ph.D., Stanford University
My doctoral work focused on the interpretive implications of doubling and the three-actor convention in Greek tragedy. At Randolph, my students and I put that work on its feet by continuing the R-MWC Greek Play tradition, begun in 1909 by Greek Professor Mabel K. Whiteside. Directing the plays provides insight into the realities facing the ancient playwrights, and my research continues to argue that you cannot understand the plays without understanding how they were played. I have now directed 12 productions using original practices, 11 in the Whiteside Greek Theatre on campus and one in Greece as part of the 2009 summer travel seminar, “Practical Wisdom: Philosophy and Drama in Greece.”
Although Greek drama is my specialty, I love teaching any course that leads students into an understanding of ancient literature and culture, in translation or in the original language. I haven’t met an obscure grammatical term I don’t love, and I do my best to inspire your passion for them as well in my ancient Greek courses. I also try to help students remember that the point of learning that declension or conjugation is to be able to read the words of the ancients, and to draw us that much closer to understanding them and their importance to us.
What Our Students Say
“When doing a translation with Dr. Cohen’s supervision, it feels as if she is sitting right beside you every step of the way. Videos on the material alongside reading each chapter of Hansen and Quinn gave me a fairly good grasp of each concept even if I was not automatically picking up on everything that was going on immediately. I wanted to learn Ancient Greek in order to read original texts written by Plato and other Greek philosophers; I feel like I’m getting closer to that goal everyday.”
– Evan Pausic ’21
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