I’ve been thinking and talking about walls a good bit lately — including an hour long conversation with David Pettegrew about the fortification of the eastern Corinthia. Last week I posted some scrappy notes on the Hexamilion Wall vaguely related to a paper that I’ll give in November at Michigan State. David and I discussed… Read More →
I was excited to see that the latest issue of Hesperia (93.1 for those of you keeping a scorecard) arrived just in time for the weekend. Since there was no Formula 1 this weekend, I was able to read an article during the time that I would have ordinarily been sitting and listlessly watching a… Read More →
Over the last few years I’ve thought more and more seriously of returning to graduate school to pursue an MA in English. I’ve been lucky enough to teach a few classes in the English department and to spend time with English undergraduates and graduate students working on the literary journal NDQ. These experiences have refired… Read More →
I have a phobia of reading old books. It’s irrational as most phobia are, but nevertheless guides my actions to an embarrassing extent. As a result, it took a particular nudge from my buddy Kostis Kourelis (and a generous copy of the book) to will myself to read Kevin Lynch’s What Time Is This Place?… Read More →
I really enjoyed Kevin Dicus’s recent article in AJA 126.4: “Refuse and the Roman City: Determining the Formation Processes of Refuse Assemblages Using Statistical Measures of Heterogeneity.” This article pushed me to read Guido Furlan’s 2017 article in EJA 20.2: “When Absence Means Things Are Going Well: Waste Disposal in Roman Towns and its Impact on… Read More →
This summer, I’ve enjoyed working with David Pettegrew on an article surveying the archaeology of the Late Antique Corinthia for some or another edited volume. The piece is getting pretty close to being done and I plant to work on it for a four or five hours this morning. I’m particularly happy with the introduction,… Read More →
The last couple weeks have been a real struggle for me personally and professionally. I’ve been sort of drifting through my days in a post-COVID fog and have found it incredibly difficult to focus enough to write anything longer than a few sentences. This is particularly intense in the afternoons when I start to fatigue. I… Read More →
As readers of this blog know, I’m a sucker for an alliterative title and Erin Thompson’s Smashing Statues: the Rise and Fall of America’s Public Monuments (2022) is spectacular and as Joe Tessitor is known to say “wildly entertaining.” Thompson’s book explores the stories associated with erecting of statues honoring US Presidents, Confederate generals and soldiers, and Christopher Columbus in the early… Read More →
Over the last ten years or so, I’ve thought a bit here and there about urbanism. Some of this was motivated by my time thinking about and working in the boom towns of Western North Dakota’s Bakken oil patch. More recently, however, doing some research on the mid-century development of Grand Forks has likewise stimulated my… Read More →