Judith P. Hallett

Judith Hallett (jh10@umail.umd.edu), Professor and Chair of Classics, specializes in Latin language and literature;  ancient Roman and Greek civilization; women, sexuality and the family in classical antiquity;  and the classical tradition in America.  Author of FATHERS AND DAUGHTERS IN ROMAN SOCIETY:  WOMEN AND THE ELITE FAMILY (Princeton 1984), she has edited and contributed to several collections of essays, most recently COMPROMISING TRADITIONS:  THE PERSONAL VOICE IN CLASSICAL SCHOLARSHIP with Thomas Van Nortwick of Oberlin College (Routledge 1996);  FEMINAE DOCTISSIMAE ET PRAESTANTISSIMAE:  SIX NORTH AMERICAN WOMEN CLASSICISTS (special issue of CLASSICAL WORLD 1996-1997), for which she wrote the featured article on Edith Hamilton; ROMAN SEXUALITIES with Marilyn Skinner of the University of Arizona (Princeton 1997);  and ROME AND HER MONUMENTS: ESSAYS ON THE CITY AND LITERATURE OF ROME IN HONOR OF KATHERINE A. GEFFCKEN (Bolchazy-Carducci 2000). She is also the author of the four essays on classical Roman women writers in WOMEN WRITING IN LATIN (Routledge 2001).  Her other publications include chapters in books, articles, reviews and translations into both English and classical Latin.

Hallett received her BA from Wellesley College and her MA and PhD in Classical Philology from Harvard University. While attending Harvard, she studied at the American Academy in Rome;  after receiving her doctorate, she spent a year at the Institute of Classical Studies at the University of London.  She was Blegen Visiting Scholar in Classics at Vassar College, and held a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities.  In 1992-1993 she was a Distinguished Scholar-Teacher, and has been given the College of Arts and Humanities Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Since 1986, Hallett has been featured on "The Court of Ideas," a long-running Canadian Broadcasting Company educational radio program, as an expert witness on the death of Cleopatra, the criminal conduct of the emperor Nero, the treasonable behavior of the British queen Boadicea, and the claims to equal rights of the Greek poet Sappho.  She has been interviewed by Sander Vanocur for the History Channel/A & E series "Movies in Time": on the re-broadcast of the British Broadcasting Campny's serialization of I, CLAUDIUS, and on the airing of the 1963 film THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.  Her other History Channel/A&E appearances include the segment on Antony and Cleopatra for their 1998 Valentine's Day special on the five greatest love affairs in history, and for their 1999 series on THE HISTORY OF SEX.  A consultant on the upcoming PBS documentary series, THE FIRST CENTURY OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, funded in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities, she will appear in all four episodes of the series, which will air in the fall of 2001.  She was the co-organizer of the February 2001 Historical Clinical Pathological Conference on the death of the emperor Claudius, and a coordinated conference on neuropsychiatric illnesses in the Julio-Claudian dynasty, at the University of Maryland medical school.