Social Networking among Women in Greek and Roman Comedy

Abstract

This article examines the literary representation of women's social networks in comedy. I combine evidence from Aristophanes, Menander, Plautus, and Terence to answer two fundamental questions: 1) Who is in a woman's social network? 2) What activities do women engage in together? Finally, I discuss the literary representation of women's networks more broadly, focusing on four sample plays, which I selected for the size, strength, or composition of the women's social network. Because of the androcentric nature of the genre, women's relationships are imagined as analogous to or intertwined with those of men.