As an under­grad­u­ate, I had a Clas­sics pro­fes­sor who some­times spoke of the human­i­ties’ task as the search for the strange in the famil­iar, and the famil­iar in the strange. The idea stuck with me, and in my own classes I have attempted to cre­ate an envi­ron­ment in which stu­dents re-evaluate their pre­con­ceived notions, and simul­ta­ne­ously estab­lish con­nec­tions to what may seem remote or exotic. Since most of my courses revolve around the cul­tural his­to­ries of cities, nor­mally this is a rather safe exer­cise. How might a 19th-century urban dweller find our sar­to­r­ial habits unusual? How might we draw par­al­lels between Brasília’s devel­op­ment and that of more tra­di­tional capitals?

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