Faculty and Staff
Joan Burton is Chair and Professor of Classical Studies at Trinity. She received her B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley and has been part of the Trinity faculty since 1988. Dr. Burton's research and teaching interests include Greek literature and social and cultural history from Antiquity through the Byzantine period. Special interests also include religious and intellectual history. She is the author of two books: Theocritus's Urban Mimes: Mobility, Gender, and Patronage (California Press 1995) and A Byzantine Novel: Drosilla and Charikles, by Niketas Eugenianos, a bilingual edition, translated with introduction and explanatory notes (Wauconda, Ill.: Bolchazy-Carducci 2004). Other publications include "Women's Commensality in the Ancient Greek World," Greece and Rome 45 (1998), 143-65; "Reviving the Pagan Greek Novel in a Christian World," Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 39 (2000), 179-216; "Abduction and Elopement in the Byzantine Novel," Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 41 (2002), 377-409; "The Reemergence of Theocritean Pastoral in the Byzantine Novel," Classical Philology 98 (2003), 251-273 and "Byzantine Readers of the Novel," T. J. G. Whitmarsh, ed., Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).
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Valerio Caldesi Valeri is a Visiting Assistant Professor for 2008-9. Currently a doctoral candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, he received his B.A. from the University of Padova, Italy, and his M.A. from the the University of Venice, Italy. His interests include Greek epigraphy and ancient historiography. He is writing a dissertation on the significance of the Cretan king Minos for the ancient Greeks' reflections on monarchy, tyranny, thalassocracy, and lawgiving; portions of his project have been delivered in the form of papers at the APA and CAMWS meetings.
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Rose Cohen-Brown, Senior Secretary in Classical Studies was born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She is a graduate of Carleton College (Magna Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa) and has an MA in English Literature from the University of Rochester. Before coming to San Antonio in 2003, Rose was an international student and scholar advisor at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. She has two daughters, one granddaughter and a cat, and is active in local community
theater.
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| Erwin Cook, T. Frank Murchison Distinguished Professor of Classical Studies, received his Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. He is the author of The Odyssey in Athens: Myths of Cultural Origins, (Cornell University Press 1995), selected as "One of the Outstanding Academic Books of 1996" by Choice. Dr. Cook's research and teaching interests include Greek epic, Archaic Greek History, Greek Religion, and Comparative Mythology. Recent publications include "Agamemnon's Test of the Army in Iliad Book 2 and the Function of Homeric Akhos," American Journal of Philology 124 (2003) 165-198, and "Near Eastern Prototypes of the Palace of Alkinoos," American Journal of Archaeology 108 (2004) 43-77. Current projects include "Nestor's Big Adventure: On Making Sense of Iliad 8", "The Linguistics of Homeric epei" (co-authored with Mark Southern), "On the Role of Folk-Etymology in Teaching Homer", and "Homeric and Bronze Age Pylos" (co-authored with Thomas Palaima). |
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James Gallagher is a Lecturer for the Department of Classical Studies at Trinity, where he has taught since 1991. Dr. Gallagher received a B.Sc. from Union College and both an M.A. and Ph.D. in Classical Studies from the University of Ottawa. Before coming to Trinity he taught for several years at Carleton University and at the University of Ottawa, both located in Ontario, Canada.
While interested in Roman archaeology and history, he has developed a specialization in ancient science and technology, teaching a course on this topic regularly at Trinity. He has participated in all phases of archaeological fieldwork, spending many seasons with a team from the University of Ottawa excavating at the ancient site of Carthage. He also co-directed excavations of the theater and surrounding area in the Roman settlement at Saint-Bertrand-de-Comminges, France. He has also collaborated in designing and facilitating various community education programs about archaeological excavation and cultural interpretation for both the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the Witte Museum. He has published research on Greco-Roman ceramics technology and mud brick architecture in addition to his contributions to excavation reports. |
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Robert Germany is a Visiting Assistant Professor for 2007-8. Robert comes to us from the University of Chicago's Classics program, where he recently received his Ph.D. with a dissertation on vision and imitation in Roman comedy. He received his B.A. with highest honors in Classics from University of Texas, Austin, with minors in Mathematics and German. He also studied at the University of Basel in Switzerland. This summer Robert and his family will be moving to Pennsylvania, where Robert has accepted a tenure-track job at Haverford College.
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| Nicolle Hirschfeld joined Trinity University in Fall 2004 as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Classical Studies.She received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr and her Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin, with an M.A. in nautical archaeology from Texas A&M. Dr. Hirschfeld has published widely on the material culture of the ancient world, with a special focus on early Cypriot scripts. She has taught a great variety of courses, including the history of seafaring, women in the ancient world, mythology, Roman civilization, and Latin and Greek. A recipient of a Mellon Foundation grant, Dr. Hirschfeld's publications include articles on such diverse topics as the history of women in archaeology and on ancient maritime commerce.
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Thomas Jenkins, Associate Professor of Classical Studies, received his B.A. from Yale University and Ph.D. from Harvard University, with subsequent positions at Washington & Lee and Rice Universities.
Dr. Jenkins' interests include literacy and orality in the ancient world (particularly as refracted through mythical narratives); ancient and modern theatrical performance; and the reception of classical antiquity. His publications include Intercepted Letters (Lexington Books 2006); "The Writing In and (Of) Ovid's Byblis Episode," Harvard Studies in Classical Philology (2000), pp. 439-451; "At Play with Writing: Letters and Readers in Plautus" (TAPA, 2005); and "An American 'Classic': Hillman and Cullen's Dialogues of the Courtesans" (Arethusa, 2005), for which he was awarded the 2006 Rehak Award by the Lambda Classical Caucus (pic). Dr. Jenkins is also a member of the Program for Comparative Literature, for which he has created a new course on reception theory, entitled Antiquity and Modernity. Dr. Jenkins also sings cheezy cabaret songs from the 1930s. Dr. Jenkins's home page is here.
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Grant Nelsestuen, a Visiting Assistant Professor for 2008-9, received his B.A.
in Classics and History from the University of Michigan and his Ph.D. in Classics from the University of Texas at Austin, where he wrote a dissertation entitled “Varro the Agronomist: Political Philosophy, Satire, and Agriculture in De Re Rustica.” Grant is especially interested in Roman cultural
history, ancient geography and the representation of space, and Greek intellectuals of the late Hellenistic period.
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Tim O'Sullivan, Assistant Professor of Classical Studies, received his B.A. from Princeton University and his Ph.D. in Classical Philology from Harvard University, with a dissertation entitled "The Mind in Motion: The Cultural Significance of Walking in the Roman World." His research interests include Augustan literature, Roman cultural studies, and the art and architecture of Roman domestic space. He has written articles on the connection between walking for leisure and metaphorical travel in the Roman villa (Classical Philology 101 (2006) 133-52) and on the portico frame of the Odyssey Landscapes (American Journal of Philology 128 (2007) 497-532). Current research projects include an article on the theme of death ante ora parentum in Virgil's Aeneid and a book entitled Romans Walking: Identity in Motion.
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Willy Razavi joined the Classical Studies Department in August 2006. Born in Tehran, Iran and raised in Helotes, Texas, Willy is a Trinity alum (’95) and has a Master of Fine Arts degree in Playwriting from Brandeis University. He served as Theatre Coordinator at Trinity from 2000-2003 and continues to be involved in theatre as a writer, director, actor and critic. In addition to his creative work, Willy’s scholarship includes presenting a paper on re-assessing context in staging Aeschylus’ Persians at the IFTR/FIRT conference as part of the Prague Quadrennial conference on scenography in 1999.
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Colin Wells, T. Frank Murchison Distinguished Professor of Classical Studies, Emeritus, received his B.A., M.A., and D.Phil. from the University of Oxford and taught at the University of Ottawa for many years before joining the Trinity faculty in 1987. Dr. Wells retired in 2005 and currently lives in Normandy, France.
From 1976 to 1986 Dr. Wells was director of the Second Canadian Team excavations at Carthage, Tunisia, and since 1990, he has directed the Trinity University excavations at the same site.
His first book was The German Policy of Augustus (1972) and Roman frontier studies are still among his prime interests, which also include Roman social and economic history, especially the role of the army, and the transition from the Roman to the Islamic period in North Africa.
A second U.S. edition of his latest book, The Roman Empire, was published in 1995 by Harvard University Press. |
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