Verity Platt lecture: 'The Wisdom of the Hive: What Ancient Beekeeping Teaches Us about How to be Human'
125 Convocation Way, Longmire 110
About the Event
The FSU Humanities Center will sponsor a series of eight lectures during the academic year 2026-2027. The lectures represent a range of disciplinary specialties within the humanities. Lecturers will present research that is taking humanities scholarship in new directions, deepening disciplinary expertise while demonstrating how thinking across disciplines is advantageous to the broader project of the humanities. The center anticipates that these lively afternoon events will advance discussion about the role of the humanities in higher education, and especially as an enterprise that teaches students to think critically, acquire competence in one or more fields, and prepare them for the responsibilities and opportunities of citizenship.
All lectures are planned for Thursdays at 4:30 p.m. in Beth Moor Lounge in the Longmire Building, with receptions following from approximately 6-6:30 p.m. The lectures are free, open to the public, and do not require advance registration. For questions regarding the lecture series: humanities.center@fsu.edu.
Abstract
From Pliny the Elder’s Natural History to Thomas Seeley’s Honeybee Democracy, humans have long been fascinated by the social dynamics of beehives. As a classicist and novice beekeeper, I will explore how ancient authors looked to bees to explore different models of social behavior, political organization, aesthetic pleasure, and even mortality itself, asking: Why are we so keen to see kinship in insect communities? How do bees help us see the strengths and flaws of our own social structures? And how does our identification with the apian rub alongside human dependency upon and exploitation of honeybee production?