Padilla Peralta, Dan-el. "Biopolitics and citizenship in Euripides’ Ion." Throughlines. www.throughlines.org/suite-content/biopolitics-and-citizenship-in-euripides-ion. [Date accessed].
Biopolitics and citizenship in Euripides’ Ion
How was the concept of citizenship constructed in ancient Athens and how is it deeply tied to race, belonging, and women's bodies?
Questions of citizenship, belonging, and national identity shape contemporary life. Who is and who is not a citizen, and how this is determined across national and racial lines, has a deeply rooted history. In ancient Greece, tragedians like Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides responded to their particular political moment with plays that demanded audiences to consider the nature of citizenship and nationality within their society. Dan-el Padilla Peralta expounds on how Euripides’ Ion deals with the question of citizenship and how it resonates across the long history of racialization.
Further learning
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La Chanson de Roland and white supremacist medievalisms
La Chanson de Roland as a national epic was a product of both European nationalist and colonial aspirations. It's important for students to understand how the poem and its histories can reiterate Eurocentric white supremacist values if not properly contextualized.