HIST 15
Homer in Vietnam Winter 2022

This is not the current course catalog

This course will examine the impact of combat trauma on American soldiers during the war in Vietnam, and how that trauma affected their return to the United States. We will read two books that explore these issues through lens of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Jonathan Shay’s Achilles in Vietnam and Odysseus in America. We will discuss how Homer’s classics have come to represent the trauma of war and coming home from the Trojan War to the current wars in the Middle East and beyond. In addition to discussing these two books, we will also view a number of films that address these issues. The class will be primarily based on the readings and films.