Hi, r/AskHistorians, I’m Curtis Dozier, and I study appropriations of ancient Greece and Rome by contemporary hate groups. I’ve been documenting examples of these since 2017 at my website, Pharos: Doing Justice to the Classics
, and I’ve written the first book-length study of the phenomenon, The White Pedestal: How White Nationalists Use Ancient Greece and Rome to Justify Hate.
The ancient world rears its head everywhere from the superficial engagement of the January 6th Capitol Rioters who wore Spartan-style helmets to the surprisingly in-depth analyses of authentic ancient sources found in the intellectual ecosystem of what political scientists have termed “highbrow white nationalism.” Although it’s tempting to scoff at these appropriations, I argue that we should take them seriously for what they reveal about how history is — and has been — used to nourish white supremacy far beyond political movements that are conventionally labeled “extreme” or “far right.” Ask me anything!
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