Our teacher is making us use Pamela Bradley's Cities of Vesuvius but my brother reckons that Pamela Bradley is the Macdonalds of Ancient history and that the examiners hate her stuff as it is crap. What other books are around?
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Pompeii textbook (1 Viewer)
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rhapsody11
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Your brother is a stuck up snob, and would make a fine husband for classics_chic.Eumachia said:
Bradley is a school textbook. I would like to see you try and read the really top-quality books on Vesuvius. Maybe the primary archaeological reports- last time I checked, the dig director from Milano University was up to a volume in the high 800s.
How about you read Bradley, and then if you find it's too easy for you, you can move up to the real history books; rather than assuming Bradley's trash, trying to read some hard book, trying to remember its quotations, forgetting them all in the exam, and failing?
Gummy_bear
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There is a thread about the pros and cons of pamela brady here: http://community.boredofstudies.org/showthread.php?t=37650
Personally, I havnt really read anything of hers as in class our teacher mainly gave us ancient texts to use.
Personally, I havnt really read anything of hers as in class our teacher mainly gave us ancient texts to use.
rhapsody11
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Pro: She summarises information in a no-BS, concise, yet informative way.Gummy_bear said:
Pro: She cites evidence at most necessary junctions.
Pro: She forwards differing opinions from differing scholars.
Con: She doesn't appeal to snobs that think year 12 students can read all the primary material.
Gummy_bear
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Well, i cant comment on anything about her, i havnt read anything of hers and now the HSC is finished i dont plan to. lol.rhapsody11 said:
Bradley' Pompeii text
Hi!
I like this text as it is student-friendly, well-illustrated and is highly readable. I am using it with my students, but I will also be using a range of other texts and resources as well. You shouldn't rely on just ONE text; you have to be prepared to do wide reading of the sources for this subject if you are to do justice to your study. But Bradley's texts are OK to use; I have sung her praises often in this forum. None of you can afford to be intellectual snobs!
Best wishes,
Magister
Hi!
I like this text as it is student-friendly, well-illustrated and is highly readable. I am using it with my students, but I will also be using a range of other texts and resources as well. You shouldn't rely on just ONE text; you have to be prepared to do wide reading of the sources for this subject if you are to do justice to your study. But Bradley's texts are OK to use; I have sung her praises often in this forum. None of you can afford to be intellectual snobs!
Best wishes,
Magister
gorgeousjai
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do any of u know anything about pompeii religion? serious help needed for an assesment
cheers
cheers
Found a great book on Pompeii
A friend of mine at another school put me onto Brian Brennan and Estelle Lazer's Pompeii and Herculaneum Interpreting the Evidence. Now I see what I have been missing using that Bradley stuff!!!!!!!!!! This book is really up to date - archaeological work happening now and has heaps of info that Bradley doesnt. Really easy to read and full of great web addresses.
A friend of mine at another school put me onto Brian Brennan and Estelle Lazer's Pompeii and Herculaneum Interpreting the Evidence. Now I see what I have been missing using that Bradley stuff!!!!!!!!!! This book is really up to date - archaeological work happening now and has heaps of info that Bradley doesnt. Really easy to read and full of great web addresses.
Eumachia said:
That is the book that we are using at my school (after I spent the last school holidays on a tour of Pompeii and Herculaneum with Brian and Estelle I couldn't allow the teacher of the class to use anything else could I??) However we supplement with the Lawless and Cameron book (they were also both on the tour) and Antiquity 3. We don't have Bradley's book yet but the kids are free to use it.
We encourage them to read everything available including on the net (we have two periods a week in computer labs so that makes computer research available to us this term).
It doesn't matter what text you are using you have to READ, READ and READ some more from a range of sources both ancient and modern and from the English speaking world and translations from other works.
You should never rely on just one source for information. Whenever Bradley refers to another historian, you should try and get a hold of their work and have a read of it. IMO, the internet's not as useful for ancient history as the library, but some university papers often contain good information.
X
xeuyrawp
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May I ask when this tour was?cem said:
Last school holidays - we left the day after school finished on 24th September and returned on 8th October. It was organised by Academy Travel.PwarYuex said:
If was only for Ancient History teachers and was designed to fit the new syllabus.
Another tour also went at the same time led by Phillipa Metcalfe and Jan Hurley.
The tour that I did is also running again this January for students and will run again next June for more teachers. This is the link to the tour run for students these holidays which is virtually the same as we did in September/October: http://academytravel.com.au/tours.php?tour=RM1262529802002
It was absolutely fantastic and a great way to improve our knowledge of the topic and to pick the brains of other teachers on a range of topics and methodologies of teaching.
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Kell.xox
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Re: Found a great book on Pompeii
BRADLEY has a stong link to estelle lazers work and is featured in all textsa she has written on pompeii and herculaneum. you should read into Lazers work. she is slightly inefficient and has worked with other people who have bias waysEumachia said:
Our teachers have told us not to quote Bradley, but that her books are an excellent starting point for further research. I have found that 'Cities of Vesuvius; Pompeii and Herculaneum' follows the syllabus really well. As has been said many times before on this thread, you need to read a wide variety of texts in order to have the knowledge to be able to come to your own conclusions, but Bradley is an excellent place to start. Why wouldn't you use a high school textbook when you are in high school???
gorgeousjai
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do u know where 2 find the new cities of vesuvius text book and if its worth having for revision for this years exams?
maza1989
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We have both textbooks - the Bradley and the Lawless and Cameron. I still feel that the Lawless and Cameron book is heaps better. I found Bradley boring to read and the layout was terrible.
But at least our teacher gave us both so we could use them together
But at least our teacher gave us both so we could use them together
our teacher has given our whole class Bradley as a basis for our info and then has copies of Brennan and Lazer, Demovic, Lawless and a heap of others which we have to supplement from.
i reckon Bradley is good cos it gives a clear outline which is both generalised and fact filled. and she includes a huge range of sources which is also handy.
is anyone going to those hsc study days coming up for ancient history?
there is one run by brennan and lazer and then there are others too.
worth considering!
i reckon Bradley is good cos it gives a clear outline which is both generalised and fact filled. and she includes a huge range of sources which is also handy.
is anyone going to those hsc study days coming up for ancient history?
there is one run by brennan and lazer and then there are others too.
worth considering!
dasphoebus
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This is wise advice. The Bradley book is full of inaccuracies and is 20 years out of date. Students whom use it are at a disadvantage as other candidates will know heaps more. Just go between the text books Cameron/Lawless or Brennan/Lazer , and you will see that Bradley doesnt know about the 100 million dollar Herculaneum Conservation Project, the Philodemus Project or the recent work at Pompeii. The material on Sara Bisel is uncritical and she has never heard of Capasso whose work dominates the study of skeletons from Herculaneum. Informed students will know all this Most of the Bradley book is listed from Descourdres, Deiss and Michael Grant and the unreadable descriptions and maps are listed from Italian guide books - hence in poor English and the Italian names.
dasphoebus
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Unless any of you actually go to my school (unlikely) I couldn't care less if you used Bradley or not. Really, Ancient History Core doesn't require you to quote historians all that much. Everyone does this topic, so I guess if you can spell Pompeii and Herculanium you've got your 80% right there. The rest is mentioning somewhere in one of the towns, and you could even go as far as saying that Pliny's letters are "unreliable".