Faculty News

ProfessorNoel Lenski poses in his office with the group of TA’s who served as section leaders in his new “Roman Civilization” course, Barbara Werner (standing), Cisca Schreefel and Missy Johnson (left to right).

Diane Conlin is working on Flavian art and architecture in Rome. She is wrapping up an article on the controversial Flavian Cancelleria reliefs and writing her second book, Political Art and Imperial Identities in Flavian Rome. She continues as co-director of excavations at the fourth century villa of the Roman emperor Maxentius (see story on p. 1-2). She presented illustrated lectures on the 2003 survey season to the AIA Boulder chapter in December, 2003, and the AIA Portland chapter in May, 2004. Diane serves on the graduate committee in the Department of Art and Art History and advises students interested in ancient art history, Greek and Roman architectural history and classical archaeology.

Beth Dusinberre’s academic year had two very different halves. In the fall semester, she taught a graduate seminar on “Power and Ideology in Achaemenid Persia” and the introductory archaeology class, “Trash & Treasure, Temples & Tombs,” which had its enrollment increased to nearly 300. She also finished up the job of revising and revamping the department’s web site, with the help of one of the department’s able graduate students, Joanna Schmitz. She served her last semester as President of the Archaeological Institute of America, Boulder Society, and passed on the torch in January to two outstanding graduate students, Megan Aikman and Rachel Gothberg. In the spring, Beth was on teaching leave. She has been working on her second book, a publication of the seals and seal impressions excavated from the site of Gordion, in Turkey. She returned to Turkey this June and hopes to have finished the book by the end of September.

John Gibert’s collaborative edition of Euripides: Selected Fragmentary Plays II (with M. J. Cropp and C. Collard) will be published later this year by Oxbow Books. He also recently completed “Clytemnestra’s First Marriage (Euripides, IA 1148-56),” to appear in a volume of essays honoring the late Charles Segal (University of Chicago Press), while work continues on his edition of Euripides’ Ion. He is about to begin his last year as book review editor of The Classical Journal and his second year as Chair of the department. In the coming year, he will again participate in a symposium accompanying a Denver Center Theatre Company production, this time of Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex (directed by Anthony Powell, playing Jan. 27-Feb. 26, 2005).

Barbara Hill handed over the position of Latin Program coordinator to her very worthy successor, Alison Orlebeke, in January. Barbara continues her association with the Classics Department and taught Latin Teaching Methods in spring, 2004. She also serves as the Program Coordinator for the Modified Foreign Language Program. She traveled to Evanston, IL, in February for presentations on Latin for students with learning differences to parents and faculty of the Baker Demonstration School and to students in the Latin Teaching Methods class offered by National-Louis University. In late June, she gave presentations at both the American Classical League meeting in Oxford, OH, and the Glenn M. Knudsvig Memorial Symposium in Ann Arbor, MI.
Peter Hunt organized a panel to debate the application of modern theories of international relations to ancient Greece and Rome at the European Social Science History Conference in Berlin this spring. Scholars from the U.S. and U.K. presented opposing viewpoints about fourth-century Athens and the middle Republic, while Peter presented a response paper. “Reading versus Predicting Ancient History: The Applicability of Realist International Relations Theory to Ancient Warfare,” which was followed by a spirited, but congenial debate. Over the winter, Peter presented a related paper at the APA in San Francisco and completed a chapter for Brill’s Companion to Thucydides. He also maintains his interest in Greek slavery: he gave a talk on “The Archaeology of Athenian Slavery” at the Boulder Chapter of the AIA and is hard at work on a chapter of “Slavery in Greek Culture” for the forthcoming Cambridge World History of Slavery.

Peter Knox reports that he has enjoyed a delightful year of teaching, writing, and lecturing. He has been on the road a fair bit, to destinations ranging from Cambridge to Waco, with a date at the FIEC Congress in Brazil lying ahead this summer. He completed two articles for publication and several book reviews. He is looking forward to the summer months, which he plans to devote to work on his commentary on Ovid’s Epistulae ex Ponto. He does not miss administration at all, but he still looks forward to hearing from the many friends and alumni he met while he was chair.

After his year in Germany, Professor Noel Lenski returned to his job as Undergraduate Advisor in Classics with renewed enthusiasm. He taught courses in Roman Law, a new lecture course on Roman Civilization, now renamed “Bread and Circuses: Culture and Society in Ancient Rome,” and Roman Numismatics. This last, a graduate seminar co-taught with Diane Conlin, led to the creation of an exhibit of CU’s new Wink Jaffee Collection of Roman Coins which premiered before a standing-room-only crowd in April. Noel also maintained an active research program by finishing a book review, an article on public slaves in late antiquity, and nearly completing his Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine. He delivered invited lectures at Washington University in St. Louis, Princeton, and the Universities of Matera and Florence in Italy. This fall he will take over presidency of the Colorado Classics Association.
Susan Prince is completing chapters for the Blackwell’s Companion to Ancient History, fifth century (“The Organization of Knowledge”) and the Blackwell’s Companion to Socrates (“Antisthenes and Socrates”) as well as continuing work on her manuscript on the Socratic Antisthenes. In November she delivered a lecture at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign on Antisthenes’ interpretation of Homer at the invitation of former CU Latinist Ariana Traill.

Professor Eckart Schütrumpf contributed a chapter on “Slaves in Plato’s Works” to the edited volume Ideal and Culture of Knowledge in Plato (Franz Steiner Verlag). He gave lectures in Princeton, Leeds (UK), and Marburg. This summer, he is completing work on the last volume of his commentary on Aristotle’s Politics in the pleasant surroundings and excellent research facilities of the University of Freiburg, Germany.

Christopher Shields writes from “down under” in New Zealand. He is enjoying the waning days of summer as an Erskine Fellow. This year he published two books, one of which was co-written: (i) Classical Philosophy: A Contemporary Introduction (London: Routledge); and (ii), with Robert Pasnau, The Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas (Boulder: Westview). His big news is that he has accepted a position as University Lecturer and Tutorial Fellow in Oxford, United Kingdom, beginning fall 04.