Episode 39: Dr. Matheus Treuk

Legacies of Ancient Persia · May 21, 2026 · 1h 22m

Dr. Matheus Treuk Medeiros de Araujo, an Associate Professor of Ancient Archaeology at the State University of Rio de Janeiro, is interviewed by Charlotte Howley – a 4th year PhD student in UCLA’s Program of Iranian Studies. They discuss scholarly “eunuch phobia,” gender bias, and resistance to translating terms without explicit mention of castration as well as dehumanizing modern language; using diverse evidence and methods like critical fabulation, centering violence and trauma in eunuch “creation”; same-sex love in Persian contexts versus Greek/Roman anxieties; and the “uncanny” in…