good morning hugh burroughs and john swisher thanks for joining us on this episode of mosaic. it's a special pleasure to introduce you to dr. eric berlin who is a professor at the university of california berkeley. one of the many people in the bay area makes it so -- such a fascinating place to. he is here to talk to us about the antiquity around mentoring. sir you look at the world around today and the new look back in your discipline of study and you have come to some

descriptive conclusions to share with us. >> well, i have always been prompted or provoked to look into the past because of contemporary circumstances. sometimes consciously sometimes not. in my recent work, it has been motivated -- or at least in large part stimulated by some rather cream infants that the world is going through in the last 20 years or more. you can read about it in any newspaper. i'm the only one reading the newspaper everyone else was reading on my pants -- iphones or other instruments.

type in particularly concerned with ethnic conflicts that our company -- country has been wrapped up in. people think about the syrups and muslims -- and kurds, lebanon, a whole range of conflict -- conflicts, it goes on and on. some of that is punctuated by or aggravated by negative stereotyping. 18 and 19 of the other, -- a demonizing of the other who is inferior and instructional -- objectionable. needs to be dealt with. this is

a plague that has been around for quite some time and we have been increasingly sensitive to it. in part because of a very important book that was written in the 70s by edward sayid . he was an activist but also a distinguished professor of university -- of columbia and an author. his book which is called orientalism -- if he didn't quite the word he certainly made it significant so that those who are tuned to it can no longer use the word orientalism. it has a negative connotation to it. what sayid argued was that this was a perception of the easterner that came from

imperialistic colonial powers in the 19th century denigrated the east -- easterner against the westerner and the oriental has always been this negative brand. it is so influential that a few years ago the reason the book written -- another book written called occidental is an which was designed to show the other side of it which is how easterner's, particularly from islam, muslims, who 50 picked the westerner or the christian society on all similar negative stereotyping and negative -- so that we are embroiled in this us versus them and demonizing of the other. >> we will have to stop there and take a break. the topic is us and them --

dodgers and giants, things like that. he will talk about the world today in the and talk about the ancient world and tell us his insight. -- we will be right back. stay with us.

we're talking with dr. eric gruin. he studied antiquity, the greeks and the romans and the syrians and the carthaginians and the merchants. -- persians. all of those people. but he says as we look out the can see people as different from ourselves as other and we would rather attribute bad feelings and demonize them as he was saying. use it up -- you set up 10 or 20 constructs in this postmodern

world and it's scary but you think that there is another way to look at all of this. it is not us and them or black and white. >> well, what got me going -- as you said i am and ancient historian. not a historian in the modern world. i live in the modern world but i'm not an historian of it. public on the going is that the ancients are now getting the blame for all of this. there is a book published 3-4 years ago called world war, -- worlds war the 2500 shares between east and west. it refers to the conflict between the greeks and persians in this book traces all of our ethics conflicts to antiquity -- ethnic conflicts. be to define the world in different segments, barbarians,

jews and gentiles, romans and just about everybody else. so there was this kind of xenophobia. there was ethnic branding. there was races and -- races and racism. my orientation has been different. i have been trying to see without denying some of the us and them attitude was there, but try to commit -- tried to emphasize the connectivity. instead of otherness a kind of togetherness. in the sense that antiquity can

be a positive and not just the negative model to our contemporary circumstances. i have always been, i guess, interested in the linkage between the past and present. here is an instance in which the mutual perceptions and representations of one another this is different people in activity -- antiquity shows a much greater complexity than just the us and them. the good guys and bad guys. there is a great deal of overlapping. there's a lot of borrowing from one culture to another and there are number of ways in which individual cultures in which they have reshaped their own past by linking themselves to other cultures and other people's. >> an example would be -->>

will, for instance -- well for instance, in various greek city state trace those routes to foreigners and cleaned a kinship relationship. for example cadmus from phoenicia was the founder of the ancient city of themes. the romans had the same sort of thing. they saw themselves as descendents of the trojans. they didn't have any problem with ethnicity over this. they saw themselves as partly descended from trojans, partly descended from greeks, and if we choose -- -- even the choose wanted to distinguish themselves from everybody else, but the jews also appropriated

borrowed stories from the greeks and linked them to themselves. there is a wonderful legend or construct in which the jews saw themselves as related to the spartans because they claimed both spartans and jews descended from abraham. there is nothing like that in the bible. [ laughter ]but in postdoctoral -- post-apocalyptic times when the jews part of the larger creek community, they bought into some of the stories that created ties between the two cultures. so they did not feel that they needed to have a kind of altogether separate existence and everybody else was somehow -- needed to be kept at arms length or reduced to a status of inferiority to be despised and so on.

i can give you a very good example of this kind of connectivity. there is a wonderful greek story about the -- or myth -- about perseus. you might remain -- he's the son of zeus, one of his many sons through his concerts. the main story about perseus is he was the one who rescued the great damsel in distress andromeda who is chained to a rock to be a victim to a sea monster. but perseus arrived just in time, killed the sea monster, rescued the damsel and lift -- lived happily ever after. everyone was great. it was purely greek. but other people bought into it. the persians decided their name persia must come from perseus so perseus is actually the

originator in some sense of the whole persian culture. the egyptians borrowed a story in which ultimately the thought -- forefathers of perseus were egyptian. so he is simply carrying on in the kitchen tradition -- egyptian tradition. one of the stories has him sleepy sea monster off the coast of java. which is a coastal city. and in fact it serves as a kind of tourist attraction. so that guides the came to visit would point to a red spring saying, this is the blood of perseus he washed his hands after he killed the sea monster and on that rock over there, you can still see the marks of the chains were andromeda was chained before he saved her. even today, i visited jafa a

couple years ago. there is a rock out there called the rock of andromeda. so this is simply an example of this kind of overlapping cultural co-mingling as it were that really eclipses the whole idea of ups -- us and them. >> we're talking about the ancient world and how it was really connected. i have a feeling he's going to connect that to our 21st century when we come back and we will learn a little more about him. stay with us.

one of the treasures of the bay area, dr. eric gruin is kind enough to be with us. he is an emeritus professor of the classics and cal berkeley . share with us -- where did you

grow up?>> washington dc. and then i went to columbia as an undergraduate at oxford to do in a -- m a and finished up a the -- finished up at berkeley . >> why did you grow up in dc? >> they were refugees during the [ null ] occupation in vienna. they had relatives in dc and it was relatives who had to authorize -- or guarantee that they would be responsible for any people in their family who came over if there were any economic problems they would be responsible. i happened -- they happened to live in washington. >> and there you were. she put columbia avenue city oxford, how did you decide to go to oscar relevant -- >> i got a scholarship.

so you were over there and studying something and at some point you have to make a decision -- >> it started when i was an undergraduate at columbia. i had a wonderful professor named mark oswald. he was a great scholar and marvelous human being. i took a course of his as a sophomore and i went into his office because he was very congenial. i said i'm not sure what i should do and he said well you did pretty well in my class. why don't you become an ancient historian. okay. that was that. [ laughter ]and i never looked back. so he is responsible for the in the upon the profession. >> and he -- he is responsible for inflicting me upon the possession. >> and then you got a phd at harvard. what was your dissertation? >> it was on roman politics and the criminal courts.

it was a dissertation kind of book when it came out but the important -- it was the first important book about the last generation of the roman republic. >> last generation of the roman republic and here is a small home running 500 pages which i have been reading for months now. >> [ laughter ] >> i started about 20 years ago and talk -- talking with gruin i said i can't hold this in my head and he said he can't either which came as a great relief to me. but you say it's a topical work that be writing this you are reflecting on your time in the late 60s or early 70s. help us with that. >> it is not a coincidence that i wrote this book on the subject of the turmoil, the turbulence the upheaval that took place in the last generation of the roman

republic leading to the fall of the roman republic people -- people are always trying to find the reason for the decline and why all of this turbulence. i took a slightly different slant on this that had a great deal to do with the years that i lived in berkeley writing this book in the ladies -- late 60s. what impressed me most about the upheavals that were going on on campus daily, some of them demonstrations, some of them leading to violence -- what impressed me most was the continuity that went on even through this period. of constant uncertainty. that for the most part even when there were major demonstrations on campus, students still went to class. students still wrote their papers to their exams, got their degrees, and so there is no hypocrisy on their part.

some of them were very actively involved in the antiwar movement , but that sense of a -- an ongoing process, and object -- ongoing educational process which is what they were therefore, was not going to be sacrificed to this. >> it sound like there is a silver lining here. >> i think that is why i took this slant in the book which not everybody has bought, which is to emphasize the continuities rather than the trait -- change. >> not to cut you off but. my time, rethinking others in antiquity is a later work -- >>/later -- much later. >> we think the theme of this discussion, the bad guys, we

find them as evil so the thinking that -- rethinking the -- that it is still a book for our times. >> i would like to think it is still a book for our time because as i said i would like to see antiquity as a positive model rather than a negative for our times. in terms of these interconnections in the sense of a mutual regard. a mutual respect that ancient societies have for one another. i would like to see a similar kind of attitude that goes beyond the demonizing of the either -- other. the attachment and distancing of other ethnic groups and national groups because they think that that is much more -- that goes much more to the heart of ancient attitudes than does this kind of demonizing. there are

countless illustrations of that as well. >> will you would say that persia is still in our time being cast in all sorts of all -- evil stuff. and you are seeing before we go to break that if you look back in antiquity, and you have reached -- studied seven or eight simulations -- civilizations you are seeing it's a different understanding for people in this day in age. we will be right back. i didn't mean to put words in your mouth sir. [ laughter ]stay with us.

eric gruin is a scholar of antiquity and sees a lot of things going on there and helpful and applicable to us

here. you're working now and concerned about ethnicity. talk to us about that. >> i'm trying to investigate what the ancient sense of ethnicity was and whether it was as so often today, a dominant force in terms of our identity. the ancients were much more broad-minded about this. the romans considered themselves not as a single ethnic entity but that they were a combination of trojans, greeks, a trust can -- and so forth. the jews even because they encouraged and we know proselytized converts who were attached to the jewish faith even though they weren't use --

jews because they were held back by a sense of ethnicity as their identity. there was intermarriage among the jews which we forget about. almost the -- all of the non- patriarchs married non-jews. the maidservant of sarah -- joseph married an egyptian. moses married a media night. he married countless women from abroad and got in trouble for it but nevertheless people just didn't feel they had to have a few more ethnic identity. it was a mingled and mongrel identity almost. it wasn't on the grounds -- the resistance wasn't on the grounds of ethnicity or idolatry. mary a foreign woman and she leads you to worship or god, that is bad. it is not the ethnic mr. itself

-- mixture itself. if i have time for one last anecdote about rabbi -- a rabbi who went to the town of paco on the -- is up bathhouse dedicated to the greek goddess aphrodite. it was stick -- decorated with a statue of her and he went into the bathroom and came out of the bathhouse and someone said rabbi how could you go into a thin shrine decorated by a statue of aphrodite of all people. isn't this sacrilege? >>the rabbi said look i came to take a bath. they didn't make the bathhouse for the statue. they may be statue for the past. i didn't go to her domain she came to mind.[ laughter ]-- this is an example of the broad mindedness.

>> there is hope for a holistic america. very delightful man. dr. eric gruin from berkeley. thank you for your time. i hope you have enjoyed this as much as we have . ron swisher will be back with you on mosaic next time. goodbye.

good morning everyone. welcome to "bay sunday." i am frank mallicoat. good to have you on board for another terrific show. i get to play traffic coordinator of sorts. my colleagues do most of the heavy lifting here. today we will meet a woman blaze ago trail for women everywhere in the journalism field and we will do a little politicking, including a political consultant. and a computer scientist turned novel exist. our first guest the new editor and chief of the "san francisco chronicle" audrey cooper. the paper has been around for 150 years but