Re-Membering Ancient Women: Hypatia of Alexandria and her Communities

234 Pages·2017·1.21 MB·English

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English Dissertations Department of English
Spring 5-7-2011
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Cara Minardi
Georgia State University
Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/english_diss
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Minardi, Cara, "Re-Membering Ancient Women: Hypatia of Alexandria and her Communities." Dissertation,
Georgia State University, 2011.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/1945993
This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of English at ScholarWorks @
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RE-MEMBERING ANCIENT WOMEN: HYPATIA OF ALEXANDRIA AND HER
COMMUNITIES

by

Cara A. Minardi

Under the Direction of Lynée Lewis Gaillet

ABSTRACT
Re-Membering Ancient Women: Hypatia of Alexandria and Her Communities is a recovery of
Hypatia of Alexandria (355-415 ACE) as a skilled rhetorician and instructor of note who taught
in Alexandria, Egypt. This work addresses Hypatia as a missing female figure from the history of
rhetoric and follows the work of feminist historiographers in the field of Rhetoric and
Composition including Andrea Lunsford, Jan Swearingen, Susan Jarratt, and Cheryl Glenn
(among others) who note the exclusion of women from ancient schools of rhetoric, yet assert
their participation in rhetorical activities. In its recovery of Hypatia, the work recreates the
historical milieu of Roman Alexandria including Alexandria‟s ethnically and religiously diverse
population. As a woman of Greco-Egyptian decent, Hypatia‟s public work was supported by
Egyptian, Greek, and Roman legal and social customs that enabled her to lecture in public and
private, administer her own school, and advise high-level political leaders. Using feminist and
post-modern theories as a lens and fusing disciplines such as Rhetoric and Composition,
Classics, History, Philosophy, Communication Studies, Critical Theory, and Women‟s Studies,
this project demonstrates that although primary texts authored by women are scarce, historians
may still recover women and their activities for expanded historical traditions of rhetoric by
examining secondary texts. The concept of community is used as a heuristic in order to discover
communities in which Hypatia engaged and led to the discovery of women Neoplatonists of the
fourth century ACE and Neopythagoreans from the sixth through second centuries BCE. The
Neoplatonists and Neopythagoreans usually married only those who shared their belief system;
hence, women were commonly educated and participated in their communities to secure the
survival of their respective group. Included is a sustained critique of historiographical methods
that may allow feminist historiographers to return to the ancient period to conduct much needed
further research.

INDEX KEYWORDS: Rhetoric, History of rhetoric, Women, Ancient rhetoric, Alexandria,
Feminist historiography, Classical history
RE-MEMBERING ANCIENT WOMEN: HYPATIA OF ALEXANDRIA AND HER
COMMUNITIES

by

Cara A. Minardi

A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
In the College of Arts and Sciences
Georgia State University
2011
Copyright by
Cara A. Minardi
2011
RE-MEMBERING ANCIENT WOMEN: HYPATIA OF ALEXANDRIA AND HER
COMMUNITIES

by

Cara A. Minardi

Committee Chair: Lynée Lewis Gaillet

Committee: Beth Burmester
George Pullman

Electronic Version Approved:

Office of Graduate Studies
College of Arts and Sciences
Georgia State University
May 2011
Minardi vi

DEDICATION

This text is dedicated to my graduate student family; my partner, Peter Fontaine, and my
community of sisters; Jennifer Forsthoefel, Oriana Gatta, Juliette Kitchens, and Melanie
McDougald, for their unconditional love and support.
Minardi vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am thankful for the aid of an Advanced Teaching Fellowship from the Department of
English at Georgia State University that enabled me to complete work on this dissertation. I
would also like to thank members of the Coalition of Women Scholars in the History of Rhetoric
and Composition for their encouragement and mentoring over the years. In particular,
conversations with Suzanne Bordelon, Lindal Buchannan, Nan Johnson, Jacqueline Jones
Royster, Gesa Kirsch, and Barbara L‟Eplattenier have helped me to consider and reconsider my
work. A special thank you to Mary Hocks who volunteered to comment on each chapter of the
first draft. I would also like to thank committee members Beth Burmester and George Pullman
for their close reading and astute advice. My dissertation chair Lynée Gaillet deserves many
special thanks for listening, guiding my work, and being patient and supportive with and of me. I
do not know how I would have finished this work without her.
Minardi viii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction 1
Chapter One: The Problems of History 9
Chapter Two: Historical Context 36
Chapter Three: Hypatia of Alexandria 68
Chapter Four: Women in the Ancient
Mediterranean 99
Chapter Five: Pedagogy 140
Conclusion 155
Appendix A: Resources 158
Appendix B: Timeline of Women
Minardi 1

PREFACE
Historians such Andrea Lunsford, Jan Swearingen, Susan Jarratt, and Cheryl Glenn
(among others) note the exclusion of women from ancient schools of rhetoric, yet assert the
participation of women in rhetorical activities. “Re-Membering Ancient Women: Hypatia of
Alexandria and Her Communities” recovers Hypatia of Alexandria (355-415 ACE) as a skilled
rhetorician and instructor of note who taught in Alexandria, Egypt. I posit that Hypatia learned
rhetorical strategies in order to lecture in public and private, administer her own school, and
advise high-level political leaders. My recovery of Hypatia recreates the historical milieu of
Roman Alexandria including Alexandria‟s ethnically and religiously diverse population that
served to empower her activities.
My concern for discovering communities in which Hypatia engaged led me to explore
pagan and Christian communities that believed the soul was without sex, and in which women
were expected to be educated and participate as writers and teachers in their communities. My
work breaks new ground because it identifies ancient women trained in rhetoric during Hypatia‟s
life time as well those who were educated centuries before her; many of these women wrote and
taught in their communities and Hypatia may have been familiar with their work through her
access to the Library of Alexandria.
I also offer a sustained critique of historiographical methods that may allow feminist
historiographers to return to the ancient period to conduct much needed further research.
Using feminist and post-modern theories as a lens and fusing disciplines such as Rhetoric and
Composition, Classics, History, Philosophy, Communication Studies, Critical Theory, and
Women‟s Studies, this project demonstrates that although primary texts authored by women are
scarce, historians may still recover women and their activities for expanded historical traditions