Representation of Byzantium in Young Adult & Children’s Literature

SNF Centre for Hellenic Studies

Join us on Friday, April 17th for the final talk in our 2026 Spring Speaker Series!

W.A.C. Bennett Library, SFU Burnaby

The Stavros Niarchos Foundation Centre for Hellenic Studies at Simon Fraser University is pleased to present <a href="https://nured.auth.gr/wpnured/en/faculty/angelaki-rozy-triantafyllia/" title="https://nured.auth.gr/wpnured/en/faculty/angelaki-rozy-triantafyllia/" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Dr. Rosy-Triantafyllia Angelaki</a>, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki!Join us Friday, April 17th at 2:30pm in person at the Bennett Library, SFU Burnaby, Room 7200, or online (<a href="https:// https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88391363383" title="https:// https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88391363383" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88391363383</a>), for her talk “Reflections on the Representation of Byzantium in Young Adult and Children’s Literature: Exploring Issues of Identity and Ideology”. This talk will be moderated by <a href="https://www.sfu.ca/hellenic-studies/humans/people/d-krallis.html" title="https://www.sfu.ca/hellenic-studies/humans/people/d-krallis.html" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Dr. Dimitris Krallis</a>, Professor, Department of Global Humanities.Attendance is free. The event is open to the public and will be recorded.This programming is made possible thanks to the generous support of the <a href="https://trk2.cp20.com/click/ds9u-30aiqm-3bgbbp-cocw1z88/" title="https://trk2.cp20.com/click/ds9u-30aiqm-3bgbbp-cocw1z88/" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Stavros Niarchos Foundation</a> (SNF).

AbstractThis talk examines how Byzantium is represented in Greek literature for children and adolescents from 1955 to the present, focusing on how the Byzantine past is interpreted and reshaped for young readers. It draws on two distinct research projects conducted over eight years, each analyzing different categories of children’s books about the Byzantine era. The first study looked at thirty-five historical novels, exploring how representations of Byzantium have evolved and how authors connect Byzantine history to Greek identity and multicultural awareness. The second focused on thirty-five nonfiction picture books about Byzantium, a relatively understudied genre that blends factual information with narrative elements. It investigated how these books present reliable, accessible historical knowledge while remaining engaging for young readers. This study also explored categorization, narrative conventions, and the integration of text and images. Finally, it evaluates how these works connect past and present, encourage curiosity, and balance educational and aesthetic goals while avoiding stereotypes and addressing both children and adult readers. Dr. Angelaki's talk brings the findings of the aforementioned studies together to showcase the evolving place of Byzantium in the thought world of young Greeks.

Speaker Biography<a href="https://nured.auth.gr/wpnured/en/faculty/angelaki-rozy-triantafyllia/" title="https://nured.auth.gr/wpnured/en/faculty/angelaki-rozy-triantafyllia/" target="_blank" data-msys-clicktrack="0" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">Rosy-Triantafyllia Angelaki</a> is Assistant Professor in the Department of Early Childhood Education, Faculty of Pedagogical Studies, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She teaches courses on historical and critical approaches to children’s literature. She coordinates scientific teams responsible for the evaluation of Hellenic language and literature textbooks for primary education in Greece, is a member of the pool of selected evaluators at the General Secretariat for Research and Innovation, and teaches at the National Centre for Public Administration and Local Government, as well as in a postgraduate program of the Faculty of Theology at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She holds a BA in History, an MA in Turkology and the History of the Balkan Peninsula, and a PhD and Postdoctoral Diploma of Specialization in Children’s Literature and History. She has worked at the Centre for Byzantine Research and, since 2004, has participated in numerous national and international research projects.She has received scholarships for her studies and research from the Society for Macedonian Studies and the State Scholarships Foundation. For her transcription and translation of Ottoman registers from the Archive of Confiscated Properties of the Public Treasury (Muhallefat Beytü’l-mal) held at the Ottoman State Archives in Istanbul, she was awarded fellowships by the Foundation for Education and European Culture and the Melina Mercouri Foundation. In 2024, she received a scholarship from the State Scholarships Foundation for her teaching activity, specifically for the instruction of Hellenic language, culture, literature, and the arts at universities in the United States, with the aim of highlighting the contribution of Hellenic culture to the formation of universal civilization. Currently is the academic organizer and coordinator of an educational program focused on innovative teaching approaches to the instruction of the Hellenic language, addressed to educators of the Greek Diaspora. The program was implemented with the funding and in collaboration with the Department of Greek Education of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America.

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Representation of Byzantium in Young Adult & Children’s Literature

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