Antiquity 2050
Exploring the Past as a Laboratory for the Future
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Classical Archaeology is still widely perceived as a discipline concerned primarily with the study and preservation of the past. Its relevance to contemporary society is therefore often framed in terms of cultural heritage and the transmission of historical knowledge. Yet archaeological research has much broader implications. It investigates long-term processes of social and environmental change, periods of crisis and adaptation, technological and cultural innovation, patterns of mobility, the management of scarce resources, and the structures through which societies organise themselves politically and socially. These are not merely questions of historical interest. In an age of rapid transformation and growing global challenges, they speak directly to some of the most pressing issues of the present and the future. Antiquity 2050 – Exploring the Past as a Laboratory for the Future starts from this premise. The project seeks to demonstrate how Classical Archaeology can contribute to contemporary debates about the future by bringing the long-term perspectives of the past into conversation with the challenges of the present. Its aim is not simply to communicate archaeological knowledge, but to explore what archaeology can contribute to the way we think about contemporary and emerging societal challenges. At the heart of the project is a new public dialogue series organised by the Chair of Classical Archaeology. The series brings together scholars from a range of disciplines with practitioners and representatives from politics, culture, business, and civil society. Each event focuses on a major issue shaping the future and approaches it from both contemporary and archaeological perspectives. Antiquity is not treated as a blueprint for the present, nor as a source of supposedly timeless solutions. Instead, it serves as a historical field of experience through which contemporary developments can be examined critically, assumptions can be questioned, and alternative ways of thinking can be explored. Contact: Dr. Claudia Schmieder and Dr. Leon Schmieder |
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The Concept Antiquity 2050 is deliberately conceived as something different from a conventional lecture series or programme of public talks. Rather than presenting established research findings to a passive audience, it creates a dialogue-based laboratory for knowledge and ideas. Each event brings together perspectives that would not normally encounter one another in the same academic setting and creates an open, moderated forum for exchange. The distinction between experts and audience is deliberately softened. Scholars contribute their specialist knowledge, while members of the public contribute their own experiences, questions, and perspectives. Knowledge is therefore not understood as something that simply flows from academia into society. Instead, the project creates a space in which academic expertise and public experience can challenge, complement, and reshape one another. The point of departure is not the past itself, but the questions confronting society today and the challenges that may shape the decades ahead. In this sense, Antiquity 2050 seeks to broaden the role of Classical Archaeology: from a discipline primarily concerned with reconstructing what has been to one that also asks what the past can contribute to our understanding of what might be. Archaeological knowledge offers neither predictions nor ready-made answers. What it can provide are long-term perspectives, comparative horizons, and evidence of alternative ways in which human societies have responded to changing circumstances. |
Key Topics Each event focuses on a pressing issue that will shape the future. Short contributions from scholars of Classical Archaeology, researchers from other academic disciplines, and practitioners working on the issue under discussion provide different perspectives on the topic. These perspectives are then brought together in a moderated discussion, with the audience playing a central role in the exchange. Questions and contributions from participants are not an add-on to the academic programme; they are an integral part of the intellectual process. The series will address topics such as:
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The project takes a deliberately broad approach to public engagement with research. Science communication is not understood as a unidirectional process in which academics produce knowledge and the public receives it. Antiquity 2050 instead treats public engagement as a reciprocal process in which scholarly expertise encounters lived experience, social concerns, and perspectives from outside academia. By bringing the humanities into sustained dialogue with wider society, the project seeks not only to make archaeological research more visible, but also to rethink what the humanities can contribute to public debate. Classical Archaeology thus becomes more than a discipline that reconstructs and communicates the past. It becomes a space in which societies can examine their own experiences of change, compare different historical trajectories, and explore alternative possibilities for the future. Antiquity 2050 asks what archaeology can do when the past is not treated as an endpoint, but as a resource for thinking critically about the future.
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