Information on NYU's Spring Semester Abroad Program: Archaeology and History in Egypt
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Student Application Form, Spring 2011 -- due May 7, 2010Security Form
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Student Schedule 2010
NYU's spring semester abroad program, Archaeology and History in Egypt, consists of three courses plus an Independent Project module. The first third of the program is an intensive seminar entitled The Oases of Egypt, which deals with the archaeology, history, and environment of the four main Egyptian oases, and incorporates field trips to sites in the Dakhleh and Kharga Oases. This course lasts for three and a half weeks. It is essentially directed at the process of integrating archaeological discovery with textual evidence and environmental information. A Colloquial Arabic class is normally also taken in January, though not for credit. This aspect of the program is meant to enhance student autonomy and to contribute to the enjoyment of living in Egypt.
The second part of the program is participation in the excavations at Amheida (ancient Trimithis) in Dakhleh under the rubric of a course called Field Work in Egypt. This occupies the next four weeks of the program (roughly February). During this period, students are involved in numerous facets of the work. Actual digging is carried out by trained local workmen under highly experienced foremen - as is mandated by law in Egypt. Undergraduate students are thus essentially apprenticed to a site supervisor and learn about archaeological interpretation and decision making. Participants in the program learn the fundamentals of recording work at an excavation (by taking notes, photographs, levels, drafting plans, filling out archaeological forms, and also by participating in archaeological survey). Students also learn to analyze what they recover through laboratory work (sorting pottery, drawing objects, updating records, etc.).
The third and final portion of the semester abroad experience is a course entitled The Archaeology of Egypt's Nile Valley, which is a seminar that occurs on site at a wide variety of locales throughout Egypt, from Aswan in the south to Alexandria in the north. Throughout March we gain perspective on Amheida and the Oases by examining the standing architecture and material remains of the ancient Nile Valley. We focus on sites that are contemporary with material that we've looked at in the Oases and are comparable in form or function (towns, temples, and elite tombs primarily, from the Old Kingdom, New Kingdom, Greco-Roman period, and Coptic period). Sites visited include such popular tourist attractions as Philae, Luxor, Saqqara, and Alexandria, but we also visit many equally fascinating sites located off-the-beaten-track. Whenever possible, we visit excavations in progress and meet some of the foremost archaeologists working in Egypt today.
Financial arrangements
NYU, Columbia College, and Barnard College undergraduates pay their normal tuition and receive their normal financial aid from their home institution. They also pay a room and board fee to the program equal to a standard room and board bill from NYU's College of Arts and Sciences. This fee includes air transportation to Egypt, all transportation within Egypt, hotel rooms when travelling, housing in the excavation house in Dakhla, all meals in the excavation house (including tea or coffee in the morning and afternoon), and a meal allowance when travelling. It also includes linen service and laundry in the excavation house (but not on the road). Students from other institutions will be billed by the Office of Global Programs for regular NYU tuition and for the board and room charge mentioned above. The tuition charge includes the 16 points of course credit provided by the program. Because different universities and colleges handle study abroad in different ways, students at institutions other than NYU and Columbia are advised to check with their study-abroad office to find out whether the home institution charges them normal fees and pays NYU or expects the student to pay NYU directly, as well as the applicability of their financial aid. Students accepted into the program are expected to pay a $500 deposit by May 31st to hold their place in the program. This deposit is credited against the fees listed above but is not refundable.
Scholarships
Pell-grant eligible students are encouraged to apply for a Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship. These scholarships are for study abroad and only for Pell-grant eligible students.
Look at http://www.iie.org/programs/gilman/index.html for details.
For further scholarship and aid information, look at the NYU Study Abroad Financial Aid page at http://www.nyu.edu/studyabroad/financial.aid/
Interested in exploring further?
Check out our Facebook group: The Amheida Project.
The information on this and attached pages is subject to change without notice. For any questions regarding program requirements, please contact the Academic Director, Ellen Morris (em129@nyu.edu). For all administrative matters, please contact Elizabeth Bulls (eb100@nyu.edu).
Independent Project:
(4 credits)
For the independent project, you are encouraged to write on a topic that integrates your own interests with material encountered in the oases. Alternatively, you may decide to conduct original research on some aspect of the material culture so far unearthed at Amheida. You may choose to specialize in a type of artifact (pottery, flints, coins, etc.) or to analyze specific contexts in depth. If you choose this route, what you produce will be archived in the library for the use of all other archaeologists who work at the site. Research at Dakhleh will be facilitated by our on-line database, by collections stored on site, and by the dig house library.
The Oases of Egypt:
(4 credits)
This seminar explores the history and culture of Egypt's western oases, especially of Dakhleh Oasis. In the course of this month, as we travel physically around Dakhleh and Kharga and chronologically from deep prehistory to the advent of Christianity, we will address a number of overarching themes. These include insularity and connectivity with respect to the Nile Valley. We'll be interested in the peaks and troughs of interest and interference in the oases and the reasons behind these fluctuations. Relations between the oasis communities and various waves of colonial settlers will be examined as will the relationship between humans and the natural environment. Inhabitants of the oases always enjoyed a rather precarious existence, due to the difficulty of water procurement, the ever-present risk of salinization, migrating sand dunes, hostile desert raiders, and general remoteness. We'll discuss the effects of changing technology (such as the domestication of the camel or the advent of the water-wheel) on oasis culture and economy. Finally, despite great cultural and technological changes over time, we'll be alert to the ways in which the realities of living on an island in the great sand sea provoked identifiable and to some degree recurrent cultural dynamics.
Evaluation: You will be expected to participate actively in seminar discussions (35%) and to give short oral presentations in class (20%) and at one or more archaeological sites (45%).
Field Work in Egypt:
(4 credits)
This intensive course is largely field-based, with additional time spent processing, recording, and analyzing materials at the excavation house. As students, you will be involved in almost every aspect of the archaeological field process. Specialists will instruct you in survey techniques, in the drafting of archaeological plans, and in the interpretation of ceramics and other highly indicative artifacts. As the bulk of excavation in Egypt is undertaken by local workmen, you will receive training as a site supervisor (with all of the necessary background in archaeological methodology that this entails). The careful records, maps, sketches, and photographs that you will produce in the course of documenting your work at Amheida will be incorporated into the excavation's archives.
It should be noted that carrying out excavations in Egypt is dependent on the timely granting of the annual permit by the Supreme Council of Antiquities and (in the case of excavations in the Western Desert) of security clearance by the Egyptian military. The first of these has so far been granted every year in time for our planned season. The security clearance, however, came very late in 2009 and substantially shortened our season, along with those of numerous other excavations. We do not anticipate a recurrence of this problem, the reasons for which are unknown and not specifically related to our project, but it is impossible to guarantee that such delays will not occur in future seasons. If they do, lectures, additional field trips, ceramic analysis, and other archaeological exercises will be substituted for part of the excavation time, and the Nile Valley seminar may be extended to incorporate additional sites and scope.
Evaluation: Your grade will be based on the quality of the records you keep (50%) and on the reports your supervisors give on your work in the field and back at the excavation house.
The Archaeology of Egypt's Nile Valley:
(4 credits)
In March, students shift their focus from the desert oases to the Nile Valley in order to place what they have studied into a wider cultural context. During the course of the month, we visit temples, tombs, settlements, and other sites throughout Egypt, from Aswan to Alexandria. Seminar sessions and class presentations will focus upon the perspective the valley monuments provide on the material studied, visited, and excavated during January and February.
Evaluation: Your grade will be based upon three criteria: the quality of your presentation on a site or a facet of a site (25%); your active and informed engagement on sites and in seminars (25%); and your daily journal (or blog!) in which you reflect on issues of importance regarding the various sites we visit.