Andrea De Giorgi surveys Seleukia Sidera (aka Claudiocaesarea)
Looking for a heads-up on what to expect from Rutgers Classics in 09/10?
Well, for a start, Andrea De Giorgi (re)joins us next September as a visiting assistant professor. In 2006/7 Andrea held a postdoctorate fellowship in the department and also taught two large lecture courses on ancient religions. He then spent 2007-2009 teaching in the Department of Classics at Case Western Reserve University. At Rutgers in 2009/10 he will offer a range of courses in Roman social history and visual culture, as well as in Latin literature.
Andrea De Giorgi on the Douglass Campus of Rutgers University
Andrea De Giorgi was educated in Classics at the Università di Torino and received his PhD at Bryn Mawr, in its Department of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology. Andrea’s dissertation—a study of the city and country of Roman Antioch on the Orontes—will appear shortly as a monograph. He’s also co-editing two works: the new Oxford Historical Atlas of the Classical World, and a study on Hellenism in Cilicia.
De Giorgi is also co-director of the newly established Isparta Archaeological Survey and is currently involved in the study and publication of the collections for Anazarbos (Cilicia) and Antioch on the Orontes at the Princeton Museum. Other than in Turkey, he has directed and participated in a variety of archaeological projects in Italy, Syria, Cyprus, UAE, and the Republic of Georgia.
Speaking of Georgia, but in this case the US Peach State…new visiting assistant professor Katherine Wasdin was born and raised in Bremen, Georgia, but has for many years now lived in New England. She was an undergraduate Classics major at Brown University (BA 2003), and will receive a fall 2009 PhD from the Department of Classics of Yale University.
Katherine Wasdin at the Old Queen’s building on the RU campus, with 1770 charter of the university
Wasdin’s Yale dissertation, “The Reluctant Bride: Greek and Latin Wedding Poems,” analyzes poems about and for weddings from the archaic Greek poet Sappho, through the Attic dramatists, Theocritus, Catullus, Statius, and all the way to Claudian, writing in the late fourth century of our era. Katherine’s particular focus in this ambitious study is on the development of imagery and the interplay between literature and culture.
Wasdin is also serving as co-editor for a collection of essays—to be published in the Yale Classical Studies series—on the reception of the Classics. That volume arose from a conference held at Yale in April 2007, that she co-directed. Though her dissertation topic is wide-ranging, Wasdin has particular interests in the literature of the Roman Empire, which she looks forward to teaching in the fall.
Andrea De Giorgi and Katherine Wasdin bring the total number of Classics faculty in the Rutgers department to nine for 2009/10.
Next year, Professor (II) Thomas J. Figueira—marking his 30th year in the Department—will offer his celebrated courses in Classics and in History. Joining him are assistant professors Emily Allen (new for 2009), Leah Kronenberg, and Timothy Power. Visiting assistant professor Matt Fox continues in the department for a third year, this time with special responsibility for Classics teaching and program development in Rutgers’ Division of Continuous Education and Outreach.
Serena Connolly will be on leave for 2009/10, on a Mellon Fellowship for Assistant Professors at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. On 1 July 2009 Corey Brennan is taking up a temporary position on the staff of the American Academy in Rome (the post of Andrew W. Mellon Professor-in-Charge) that runs through June 2012.
Azzan Yadin, associate professor in Jewish Studies and a member of the Rutgers graduate faculty in Classics, will serve as acting chair in the department for 2009/10.
Teaching assistants are RU Classics graduate students Andriy Fomin, Charles George, Eleanor Jefferson, Rachel Loer, and Constantin Pop.
From left: Azzan Yadin, Timothy Power, Serena Connolly, Emily Allen. Credit: L. Kronenberg
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