Deborah Kamen is Chair and Professor of

Classics Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

at the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

. Her research is on Greek cultural and social history, with a particular focus on ancient

slavery Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

Career

Deborah Kamen read for her BA in Classical Languages at

Bryn Mawr College Bryn Mawr College ( ; Welsh: ) is a women's liberal arts college in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Founded as a Quaker institution in 1885, Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sister colleges, a group of elite, historically women's colleges in the United St ...

in 1998, where she began studying Greek after learning Latin in high school. This was followed by an

MSt The Master of Studies or Master in Studies (M.St. or MSt; ) is a postgraduate degree at the University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, University of St Andrews, the Australian National University, University of Dublin and the University of Ne ...

Greek History The history of Greece encompasses the history of the territory of the modern nation-state of Greece as well as that of the Greek people and the areas they inhabited and ruled historically. The scope of Greek habitation and rule has varied throu ...

at New College,

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

in 1999, and an MA in Greek at the

University of California Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

in 2000. In 2005 she completed a PhD in Classics at Berkeley, with a thesis titled "Conceptualizing manumission in ancient Greece." From 2005-7 she was a Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellow at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

, before moving to the

in 2007 as an Assistant Professor in Classics. She was promoted to Professor in 2020. Between 2010 and 2019 she was one of the co-chairs of the

Lambda Classical Caucus Lambda (}, ''lám(b)da'') is the 11th letter of the Greek alphabet, representing the voiced alveolar lateral approximant . In the system of Greek numerals, lambda has a value of 30. Lambda is derived from the Phoenician Lamed . Lambda gave rise ...

, "A Coalition of Queer Classicists and Allies." Kamen has been the recipient of multiple awards for her research on Greek History. In 1998-9 she was awarded The Lionel Pearson Fellowship by the

Society for Classical Studies The Society for Classical Studies (SCS), formerly known as the American Philological Association (APA) is a non-profit North American scholarly organization devoted to all aspects of Greek and Roman civilization founded in 1869. It is the preemine ...

. In 2014 she was the Simon Visiting Professor in Ancient History at the

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

. In 2017 she and Sarah Levin-Richardson won the Barbara McManus Award for Best Article from the

Women's Classical Caucus The Women's Classical Caucus, Inc. (WCC) is an affiliate of the American Philological Association, the organization for North American scholars and teachers of Greek and Latin language, literature, and culture (known as "classicists"), Greek and R ...

, for their article "Lusty Ladies in the Roman Imaginary."

Research

Kamen works primarily on the social and cultural history of

Ancient Greece Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity ( AD 600), that comprised a loose collection of cult ...

, with particular attention to slavery. Her first book ''Status in Classical Athens'' (2013) was described as "indispensable reading for anyone interested in ancient Athenian society" and an "important contribution to scholarship." She has also written a book on ''Insults in Classical Athens'' (2020) and co-edited the volume ''Slavery and Sexuality in Classical Antiquity'' (2021).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kamen, Deborah Women classical scholars Year of birth missing (living people) Bryn Mawr College alumni University of Washington faculty Historians of antiquity University of California, Berkeley alumni Alumni of New College, Oxford Living people