BISR Language Learning and Critique - Brooklyn Institute for Social Research

BISR

BISR Language Learning and Critique 2026

BISR Language Learning

Critical Ancient Greek
Bruce King
Monday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
Critical Ancient Greek (In-Person)
Erin Petrella
Monday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
Critical Latin
Erin Petrella
Tuesday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
Critical Arabic
Ginan Rauf
Tuesday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
Critical Ancient Hebrew
Yoni Kretzmer
Thursday, 6:15-8:15pm ET
  • Classics
  • Jewish Studies
Critical Sanskrit
Arti Mehta
Saturday, 11:00am-1:00pm ET
  • Classics
Critical Modern German (In-Person)
James Wagner
Wednesday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Literature
  • Philosophy

BISR Reading Groups

Modern German Reading Group: Heinrich von Kleist (In-Person)
James Wagner
Sunday, 5:00-7:00PM ET
Arabic Reading Group: Hasan Hourani’s Hasan Everywhere
Ginan Rauf
Sunday, 10:30am-12:30pm ET
Ancient Greek Reading Group: Sophokles’ Oedipus Tyrannos III
Bruce King
Tuesday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
  • language study
Latin Reading Group: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things) II
Erin Petrella
Wednesday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Classics
  • language study
  • Latin
Ancient Greek Reading Group: Herodotus’ Histories II
Erin Petrella
Thursday, 6:30-8:30pm ET
  • Ancient History
  • Classics
  • language study
  • Latin
Ancient Hebrew Reading Group: Wisdom for Dark Times — the Book of Ecclesiastes III
Yoni Kretzmer
Wednesday, 7:00-9:00pm ET

BISR Languages Lecture Series

Aristotle and Animal Perception: Remarks on a Historically Problematic Passage — a Talk by Robbie Howton
Robbie Howton
Thursday, 6:30pm ET
  • Philosophy
Moses and Monolingualism: Freud, Derrida, and the Philology of Exile — a Talk by Miriam Leonard
Wednesday, 5:00pm ET
  • Poststructuralism
  • Psychoanalysis
“Madness” in Tragedy: Friedrich Hölderlin’s Death of Empedocles — a Talk by Jeffrey S. Librett
Wednesday, 6:30pm ET
  • Poetry
  • Psychoanalysis
Noble Simplicity and Quiet Grandeur: the Enlightenment Myth of Classical Greek Art — a Talk by Liane Carlson
Monday, 6:30pm ET
  • Art History
  • Classics
  • Enlightenment
Is Life a “Complete” or “Complex” Activity? How a Transcription Error Caused Centuries of Confusion — a Talk by Robbie Howton
Thursday, 6:30pm ET
  • Classics
Economic Cosmology: Ethics and Economics in Classical Islamic Thought — a Talk by Sami Al-Daghistani
Tuesday, 6:00pm ET
  • Classics
  • Economics
  • Islamic Studies
Sappho’s Fraying Text[ile]s: Philology and Queer Handicraft — a Talk by Ella Haselswerdt
Thursday, 6:30pm ET
  • Classics
  • Queer Theory
Anima and Animal Life: Nymphs, Satyrs, Dogs as Late Style — a Talk by Mario Telò
Tuesday, 6:30pm ET
  • Classics
Environmental and Philosophical Pessimism in Latin Literature — a Talk by Del A. Maticic
Wednesday, 6:30pm ET
  • Classics
  • Ecocriticism
From Mandarin to Chameleon: The Politics of Erich Auerbach’s Mimesis — a Talk by James Adam Redfield
Thursday, 7:00pm ET
  • Literature
  • politics
Ancient Rhetoric, Abolition, and Rev. Peter Thomas Stanford’s The Tragedy — a Talk by Kelly P. Dugan
Monday, 6:30pm ET
  • Abolition
  • Classics
What is Fair in Art and War? Representations of Violence in the Ancient World — a Talk by Türkan Pilavci
Monday, 6:30pm ET
  • Art History
  • Biopolitics
  • Classics
On Naming and Knowing Plants: Botanical Latin and the Ideal of Universal Intelligibility — a Talk by Erin Petrella
Thursday, 6:30pm ET
  • Botany
  • Latin
From Aletheia to Idea: Plato, Heidegger, and the Meaning of Truth — a Talk by Michael Stevenson
Tuesday, 6:30pm ET
What Does Oral Revelation Look Like? Comparing Rabbinic and Manichaean Textualities — a Talk by Jae Han
Wednesday, 6:30pm ET
  • Classics
On The Wings of Locusts: 125 BCE Between Climate Change and Politics — a Talk by Dan-el Padilla Peralta
Monday, 6:30pm ET