Placement & Prizes

James Kierstead has accepted an offer from Victoria University of Wellington as a Lecturer in their Department of Classics in the School of Art History, Classics and Religious Studies.  His dissertation is titled "A Community of Communities: Associations and Democracy in Classical Athens" and is advised by Josh Ober, Andrea Nightingale, and Ian Morris.

Matthew Simonton has accepted a tenure-track offer from Arizona State University's New College of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences as an Assistant Professor of Ancient History in the School of Humanities, Arts and Cultural Studies.  His dissertation was titled "The Rules of the Few: Institutions and the Struggle for Political Order in Classical Greek Oligarchies" and was advised by Josh Ober, Andrea Nightingale, and Ian Morris.

Mark Pyzyk has been awarded a three-year Stanford Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship for 2012-2015. Awarded by the Vice Provost for Graduate Education, the SIGF is one of the greatest honors Stanford gives to a doctoral student pursuing interdisciplinary research.

Megan Daniels has been awarded a Trudeau Foundation Scholarship in support of her research analyzing how ancient Mediterranean civilizations used religion to mediate the complexities of cross-cultural interaction. Read the Trudeau Foundation's full press release here.

Sarah Levin-Richardson has accepted an offer from the University of San Diego and will join the History Department as a tenure-track assistant professor in fall 2012.  

Courtney Roby joined Cornell University's Department of Classics as Assistant Professor in fall 2011.  Her dissertation, entitled "The encounter of knowledge: technical ekphrasis between Alexandria and Rome," was advised by Reviel Netz, Alessandro Barchiesi, Maud Gleason, Anastasia-Erasmia Peponi, and Jessica Riskin (History).   

Archaeology graduate student Sarah Murray has been awarded a Mellon dissertation fellowship for 2012-2013. 

Polinskaya's graduate research focused on ancient Greek religion and Greek social history. She received her PhD from Stanford Classics in 2001 and taught ancient Greek and Roman history, as well as Ancient Greek and Latin, at Bowdoin College (2001-2007) before joining the King's College, University of London faculty in 2007 She is now a  Research Fellow in Greek History.

Dan-el Padilla Peralta has been awarded a 2011 Stanford Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship.  The Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate Education awards these three-year fellowships to outstanding doctoral students engaged in interdisciplinary research.  With Federica Carugati, Dan-el was one of two Classicists to be awarded the fellowship this year and among only 17 students selected university-wide.

Timothy Sorg, who joined us in 2010 and will graduate with an MA in Ancient History in June, will enter the PhD program in History at Cornell University this fall. 

Sebastian de Vivo has been awarded a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at New York University, where he will serve as Assistant Professor/Faculty Fellow in the Department of Classics beginning in fall 2011. 

Nicholas Boterf has been awarded a Mellon Dissertation Fellowship for 2011-2012. He is writing a dissertation entitled "Lyric Cities: Poetry, Performance, and Community," which is advised by professors Peponi, Martin, Ober and Stephens. 

Elizabeth Jones has been awarded a Mellon Dissertation Fellowship for 2011-2012. She is writing a dissertation entitled "Lyric Physicality: Representations of Bodies and Objects in Archaic Greek Lyric Poetry," which is advised by professors Peponi, Martin, and Nightingale.

Matthew Simonton has accepted a 2008 Stanford Interdisciplinary Graduate Fellowship.  The Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate Education awards these three-year fellowships to outstanding doctoral students engaged in interdisciplinary research.  He was one of a twelve student inaugural cohort selected from a university-wide, highly competitive pool with over 175 applicants. Matt is using theories and methods from contemporary political science in his dissertation on Classical-era Greek oligarchies.

Sebastian de Vivo has won a Getty Research Institute Residential Fellowship for 2009-10. Sebastian will spend his year at the Getty completing his dissertation, "A Theory of the Traumatic Object in Ancient Greece: War, Memory, Materiality, advised by Michael Shanks, Richard Martin and Lynn Meskell.

Kathryn Balsley was awarded a Mellon Foundation Dissertation Fellowship for 2010-11 and offered a full-time teaching position with the Stanford Education Program for Gifted Youth.  Her dissertation, scheduled to be finished in Autumn 2010, is entitled "Performances of Justice in Imperial Literature" and advised by Alessandro Barchiesi, Susanna Braund (UC Berkeley) and Joseph Manning (Yale).

Darian Totten has accepted an Andrew W. Mellon Dissertation Completion Fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies for 2010-2011. She will spend next year completing her dissertation, "Scales of Connectivity in the Late Antique Landscape: Economic Networks in Southern Italy,"  which is advised by Jennifer Trimble, Ian Robertson (Anthropology), and Walter Scheidel. Darian was awarded the Arthur Ross Pre-Doctoral Rome Prize in 2009-2010. 

Jack will commence a tenure-track post in the Classics Department at Dalhousie University in fall 2010; from 2006-2007 he taught at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA.  He received his Ph.D. from Stanford in 2006, writing a dissertation ("The Aural Iliad") on the relationship between the Homer scholia and the performative practice of reading aloud in the Hellenistic and Imperial periods; Richard Martin was his advisor, while Susan Stephens and Reviel Netz served on his dissertation committee.  

Lidwijde de Jong has received a coveted Visiting Research Scholarship at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World in New York for the academic year 2010-11. De Jong is currently Assistant Professor in the Department of Classics at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Her Stanford dissertation, "Becoming a Roman Province : An Analysis of Funerary Practices in Roman Syria in the Context of Empire," was advised by Jennifer Trimble, Ian Morris, and Walter Schiedel.

Micah is Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Classical Studies at Indiana University in Bloomington. His 2008 Stanford dissertation, "The Frontiers of the Empire and the Edges of the World in the Augustan Poetic Imaginary," was advised by Susanna Braund, Alessandro Barchiesi, Grant Parker, and Giovanna Ceserani.

Ulrike is Assistant Professor of Classical Studies at Evergreen State College. Ian Morris,Walter Scheidel, and Ian Hodder (Anthropology) advised her 2008 Stanford dissertation, "Scale, Structure, and Organization of Archaic Maritime Trade in the Western Mediterranean: the "pointe lequin 1A"."

Bill is Assistant Professor in the Department of Classical Studies at McGill University.  His Stanford dissertation, "Foedera : A Study in Roman Poetics and Society," was advised by Susanna Braund, Alessandro Barchiesi, and Grant Parker.

James was appointed Assistant Professor of Classics at the University of Southern California in 2008; he was Lecturer at USC in 2007-8. Andrea Nightingale, Richard P. Martin, and Josiah Ober advised his Stanford dissertation, "Philosophical Advertisements : Protreptic Marketing in Fourth-century Greek Culture."

Following her two-year tenure as Florence Levy Kay Fellow in Classical Studies and Theater Arts at Brandeis University, Eirene became Assistant Professor of Classical Studies at Wesleyan University in 2009. Richard P. Martin, Marsh McCall, Andrea Nightingale, and Anastasia-Erasmia Peponi advised her Stanford dissertation, "Dancing the Emotions : Pity and Fear in the Tragic Chorus."

Jason Aftosmis has won a three-year postdoctoral fellowship from Harvard's Society of Fellows, where among other projects he will complete his dissertation, "Paradigm and Discourse in Archaic Greek Poetry," advised by Richard Martin, Anastasia-Erasmia Peponi, and Leslie Kurke (U.C. Berkeley).