Our Faculty

headshot of John H. Starks, Jr.

John H. Starks, Jr.

Collegiate Professor of Newing; Associate Professor

Residential Life; Middle Eastern and Ancient Mediterranean Studies

Education

  • MA, PhD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
  • BA, Washington and Lee University

Research Interests

  • Greek and Roman Comedy (theater history, performance, gender)
  • Non-"Western" Ethnicity around the Ancient Mediterranean, esp. Africa and the Levant
  • Hellenistic and Roman Social History
  • Greek and Latin Epigraphy
  • Roman Historiography (including Greek historians of Rome) and Classical Biography

Teaching Interests

  • Women in Ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome
  • Race and Ethnicity in Ancient North Africa
  • Cleopatra: The Last Pharaoh
  • Satire from Rome to Colbert
  • Ancient Comedy in Performance
  • Women in Ancient Theater
  • The "Other" in Latin Comedy
  • Celtic and "Germanic" Ethnicity in Latin Historians
  • Greek and Roman Biography
  • Democracy Inaction: Ancient Greek Comedy and American TV Satire
  • Greek Songs of Life and Love
  • All levels of Latin and Ancient Greek

Awards

  • °®¶¹´«Ã½ Council/Foundation Award for Faculty Service
  • Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching
  • CAAS Presidential Initiative Grant for The Ghoul Next Door: A Musical Roman Comedy (Plautus’
  • Mostellaria) and Comedy Scholars’ Colloquium
  • New York Classical Club President’s Grant for The Ghoul Next Door
  • Blegen Research Fellow, Vassar College

More Info

Select Publications

2013. “opera in bello, in otio, in negotio: Terence and Rome in the 160s BCE.†In Antony Augoustakis & Ariana Traill, edd. Blackwell Companion to Terence, 132-155. Blackwell, Malden MA/Oxford.

2011. “Was Black Beautiful in Vandal Africa?†In D. Orrells, G.K. Bhambra, T. Roynon, edd. African Athena: New Agendas, 239-257 (Classical Presences). Oxford UK.

Winner of Women’s Classical Caucus, 2015 Barbara McManus Award for Best Published Article on Gender or Women’s Studies in Antiquity

2008. “Pantomime Actresses in Latin Inscriptions.†In Edith Hall & Rosie Wyles, edd. New Directions in AncientPantomime, 110-145. Oxford UK.

Winner of Women’s Classical Caucus, 2010 Best Article Award

Curriculum Vitae

Curriculum Vitae