Classics

Classics is the study of ancient Greece and Rome, their languages, literatures, histories, philosophies, and material cultures, and the complex ways their legacies have shaped the world from antiquity to the present. At its core it involves reading Greek and Latin texts in the original languages, developing a rigour of interpretation and a depth of cultural knowledge that few other disciplines can match. But classics is also a broad and evolving field, engaging with archaeology, art history, reception studies, and the history of ideas, and asking how ancient cultures have been understood, adapted, and contested in different periods and contexts.

At the University of Liverpool, this three-year full-time programme includes a year abroad, giving you the opportunity to study at a partner institution in another country, which for a classicist might mean engaging with Mediterranean history and culture in proximity to some of its ancient sites. Liverpool's classics department has a strong tradition in both the languages and the historical and archaeological dimensions of the ancient world, and the department's connection with Liverpool's broader humanities faculty enriches the range of approaches you can bring to ancient material.

You will develop your ability to read Greek and Latin texts with increasing sophistication, engage with the literature of the ancient world across genres from epic and tragedy to philosophy and history, and study the material and historical contexts that illuminate those texts. The year abroad adds an international dimension to your study and gives you the experience of engaging with classical traditions in a different academic and cultural environment.

Classics graduates are found across an extraordinarily wide range of careers, including law, the civil service, academia, journalism, publishing, theatre and performance, heritage and museum work, management consulting, and education. The analytical precision, cultural breadth, and sustained engagement with complex texts that classics develops are valued in many professional contexts.