Classics and Letters Faculty and Staff

Richard Beck is an instructor whose primary responsibility is introducing students to the ancient Greek language during their first year and preparing them for further study. More…

Email: rbeck@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 206

Kevin Butterfield, Assistant Professor of Classics and Letters, is the first core faculty member of the Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage. He is a historian of the early American republic, studying the legal and political culture of the Revolutionary and early national periods of the United States. He is currently working on his first book manuscript, a study of the changing meanings of the concepts of voluntary association and voluntary membership in the post-Revolutionary era. More…

Email: butterfield@ou.edu | Phone: 325-2234 | Office:CARN 219 | Full CV

Jack Catlin, Professor Emeritus. Dr. Catlin received B.A. in Classics from OU in 1958, an M.A. in Comparative Literature from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1965, and a Ph.D. in Classics from UNC-CH in 1969. He returned to OU's Classics Department as a faculty member, and he became Chair of the Department of Classics and Director of the Letters Program in 1978. After a long and distinguished career as the department's leader and a beloved teacher, he retired in 2008. To celebrate his career and his devotion to his students, the department has established a scholarship in his name. We invite his friends, colleagues, and former students to make a donation in any amount to the Jack Catlin Scholarship Fund through the University of Oklahoma Foundation. We hope to begin giving the scholarship to deserving students in the near future.

Peggy Chambers, Instructor and Academic Advisor, is the author of four Latin textbooks: Latin Alive and Well, An Introductory Text; The Attic Nights of Aulus Gellius, An Intermediate Reader/Grammar Review; The Natural Histories of Pliny the Elder, An Intermediate/Advanced Reader and Grammar Review; Pliny the Youngers’ Characters as Revealed through his Letters, An Intermediate/Advanced Reader and Grammar Review. All her texts have been published or are under contract to be published by the University of Oklahoma Press. She teaches regular and Honors Latin courses as well as online courses on Greek and Roman Civilization. She is the recipient of seven teaching and advising awards. More…

Email: pchambers@ou.edu | Phone: 325-4931 | Office: CARN 106 | Full CV

Sara Coodin, Assistant Professor, specializes in literature of the English Renaissance, particularly Shakespearean drama. Her current research centers on questions of moral agency in Shakespeare, and focuses on the importance of virtue ethical concepts like eudaemonia (happiness) and ethos (moral character) to Shakespeare’s art of characterization. She recently published “What’s Virtue Ethics Got To Do With It: Shakespearean Character as Moral Character” in the volume of essays Shakespeare and Moral Agency (Continuum 2010).

Email: coodin@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 117 | Full CV

Ralph Doty, Professor of Classics and Letters. After receiving a B.A. in Letters from OU, he went to Columbia University, where he received an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Philosophy. He joined the faculty of the University of Oklahoma in 1986 and was promoted to the rank of full professor in 2002. The focus of his research is the textual tradition of Xenophon. Dr. Doty teaches Classical Mythology, Plato and the Platonic Tradition, and intermediate and advanced courses in Greek. More…

Email: rdoty@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 118 | Full CV

J. Rufus Fears, is David Ross Boyd Professor of Classics at the University of Oklahoma, where he holds the G. T. and Libby Blankenship Chair in the History of Liberty. His many awards for teaching include being chosen Professor of the Year on three occasions by students at the University of Oklahoma, the Medal for Excellence in College and University Teaching from the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence, the University Continuing Education Association (UCEA) Great Plains Region Award for Excellence in Teaching, and the UCEA's National Award for Teaching Excellence.

Email: jrfears@ou.edu | Phone: 325-0436 | Office: Cate Center, Herrick Hall #174

Ellen Greene, Joseph Paxton Presidential Professor of Classics and Letters. She received her Ph.D. from UC Berkeley in 1992. Greene’s published books include: The Erotics of Domination: Male Desire and the Mistress in Latin Poetry, Reading Sappho, Re-Reading Sappho, Women Poets in Ancient Greece and Rome, Gendered Dynamics in Latin Love Poetry (with Ronnie Ancona), and The New Sappho on Old Age. She is currently working on a study of Sappho for Blackwell. Greene teaches courses on Greek and Latin poetry, Greek drama, and Virgil and Dante. More…

Email: egreene@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 105 | Full CV

John Hansen, instructor and Academic Advisor, teaches freshman- and sophomore-level courses of Latin. Trained as a world language teacher, he is active in both the Oklahoma Foreign Language Teachers’ Association and the Classical Association of the Middle West and South. Supporting Latin in Oklahoma high schools continues to be a high priority for him. On campus, he serves as the Faculty Fellow for Sigma Phi Epsilon. More…

Email: jhansen@ou.edu | Phone: 325-8156 | Office: CARN 108 | Full CV

Kyle Harper, Assistant Professor, is a historian of the high and late Roman empire. His first book, Slavery in the Late Roman World, will be published by Cambridge University Press in 2011. A second project, From Shame to Sin: Christianity and the Making of Western Sexuality, is under contract with Harvard University Press. He teaches a range of courses on Roman history and early Christianity. Dr. Harper is also the director of OU's Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage. More…

Email: kyleharper@ou.edu | Phone: 325-4063 | Office: CARN 215 | Full CV

Rebecca Huskey, Assistant Professor, has a background in 19th and 20th Century European thought, with a concentration in ethics and theology. Her scholarship includes a book on Paul Ricoeur's concept of hope and articles and presentations on religious imagery in poetry and fiction and the intersections of religion and literature. She is currently working on an extended study of the poetry and fiction of the Native American writer Sherman Alexie.

Email: rhuskey@ou.edu | Phone:325-6921 | Office: CARN 120 | Full CV

Samuel J. Huskey, Associate Professor and Chair, is a Joseph Paxton Presidential Professor. His research interestes include Latin poetry (particularly Ovid's exile poetry), textual criticism, and digital humanities. His current projects include a translation of Boccaccio's Latin poetry for Harvard University Press' I Tatti Renaissance Library and an edition and commentary on Ovid's Ibis. He teaches Introduction to Classical Studies, Classical Mythology, and a number of courses on Greek and Roman literature. He also teaches advanced Latin courses, including Latin Prose Composition. More…

Email: huskey@ou.edu | Phone: 325-0490 | Office: CARN 109 | Full CV

Rachel Ahern Knudsen, Assistant Professor (A.B. Harvard, M.St. Oxford, Ph.D. Stanford), teaches Greek and Latin language courses as well as ancient literature in translation. She is currently revising for publication her doctoral dissertation, The Artificer of Discourse: Homeric Speech and the Origins of Rhetoric. She is also engaged in projects on the sophists' appropriation of myth and the Homeric Hymn to Hermes. Her research interests include Homer, Archaic poetry, and ancient rhetorical theory. Pedagogically, she is interested in helping students detect connections between the ancient world and modern life, particularly in the areas of rhetoric, philosophy, and poetry. More…

Email: rknudsen@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 116 | Full CV

Eric Lomazoff, Assistant Professor (B.A. University of Pennsylvania, Ph.D. Harvard) is affiliated with the Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage. A political scientist by training, he is currently at work on his book manuscript, Reconstructing the Hydra-Headed Monster: The Bank of the United States and the Constitutional Politics of Change. His research interests include the Constitution outside the Supreme Court, American constitutional history, mechanisms of institutional development, and contemporary fiscal and monetary politics. Several of these will figure prominently in his Fall 2011 Honors colloquium, "The Constitution and the Economy." In the Spring 2012 semester, he will teach a specialized course on constitutional controversies involving the state of Oklahoma.

Email: lomazoff@ou.edu | Phone: 325-2043 | Office: CARN 214 | Full CV

Andrew Porwancher, Assistant Professor (B.A. Northwestern, A.M. Brown, Ph.D. Cambridge) is currently working on a book entitled American Jurisprudence and the Law of Evidence, 1904-1940. In this study, Dr. Porwancher argues--contrary to the conventional wisdom--that evidence law was central to the development of modern legal thought. He is the author of "Objectivity's Prophet" in Journalism History and "Humanism's Sisyphean Task" in History of Education. He teaches classes in Constitutional Studies, including Introduction to Constitutional Studies, Debating Constitutional Controversies, and American Legal Philosophy. Dr. Porwancher encourages students--whether they are enrolled in his classes or not--to come into his office hours or set up appointment to discuss anything from course offerings to post-graduation plans.

Email: porwancher@ou.edu | Phone: 325-2030 | Office: CARN 213 | Full CV

Farland Stanley, Professor of Classics and Archaeology and a Gusi Peace Prize Laureate in archaeology and teaching (Manila: 2007). Over a twenty year period he has developed numerous excavation projects in the Mediterranean world among which have been projects in Israel and Italy. He currently cooperates with the Restoring Ancient Stabiae Archaeology Project at Pompeii and Stabiae in Italy. He came to the University in 1985 and has developed 24 courses. He currently teaches courses relating to Roman and Greek art and archaeology, the ancient city of Rome, and Roman culture. His publications and research relate to his archaeological projects and studies in Israel, Portugal, Spain, and Italy. He is a contributor to the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World (Princeton Univ. Press, 2000) and his current research gives focus to Roman archaeology and excavation projects, urban Rome, Roman Portugal and Roman society. More…

Email: fstanley@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 121 | Full CV

Stephen Wagner, Instructor, teaches both first- and second-year Latin and also a wide variety of courses in classical culture. More…

Email: swagner@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 115

Cheryl Walker-Esbaugh, Instructor of Classics and Faculty Advisor, edited and extensively revised Dunmore and Fleischer's Medical Terminology, which was released in a new edition by F.A. Davis in 2004.  She currently represents the Department of Classics and Letter’s on the EPD committee in the College of Education and on the College of Arts and Sciences Advisory Committee on Academic Advising (CASACAA).  She is an affiliate faculty member in the Women’s and Gender Studies Program.  She has developed and teaches Medical Vocabulary as an online class and is currently at work on a project to develop online course offerings in beginning Latin.   For the last fifteen years she has organized Classics Day which brings hundreds of High School students to the University of Oklahoma campus every year. More…

Email: Walker-Esbaugh@ou.edu | Phone: 325-3478 | Office: CARN 107 | Full CV

Cyndy Adams, Managerial Associate and Aministrative Coordinator.

Email: coadams@ou.edu | Phone: 325-6921 | Office: CARN 110

Megan Denney serves as the Program Specialist for the Institute for the American Constitutional Heritage. She graduated in 2006 from the Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism, with an emphasis in public relations and a minor in history. Two years later she earned a Master of Education in Adult and Higher Education from OU. She has been not only a long-time student at OU, but also an employee of of the university since January 2004. In addition to her various responsibilities in the IACH, she also serves as an adjunct instructor for OU's University College.

Email: mdenney@ou.edu | Phone: 325-7697 | Office: CARN 210

Angie Gauthier, Pre-law Advisor and Academic Advisor. Angie assists pre-law students with course recommendations, successful navigation of law school requirements, and providing resources and guidance in selecting a career path. She also advises Classics and Letters majors. More …

Email: angieg@ou.edu | Phone: 325-5933 | Office: CARN 111