Philip J. THIBODEAU

 

 

Education:

 

PhD, Classics, Brown University, 1999.

Dissertation:  Wonders of a World.  Essays on Vergil’s Fourth Georgic,

directed by Michael C. J. Putnam.

BA, Classics summa cum laude, Yale University, 1993.

 

Research Interests:

 

Augustan Poetry

Ancient Science

Hellenistic Philosophy

 

Teaching Experience:

 

Brooklyn College, Assistant Professor, 2004-

 

DePauw University, Visiting Assistant Professor, 2002-2004

 

University of Georgia, Visiting Assistant Professor/ Franklin Teaching Fellow, 1999-2002

 

Brown University, Lecturer, 1999

 

 

Publications:

 

  Co-edited Book

 

Being There Together:  Essays in Honor of Michael C. J. Putnam on the Occasion of his

  Seventieth-Birthday.  H. Haskell and P. Thibodeau, eds.  (Afton Press, 2003).

 

 

  Articles

 

“The Addressee of Vergil’s Eighth Eclogue,” forthcoming, CQ (10 pp.).

 

“The Stoic Theory of Mixture,” under review, Phronesis (65 pp.).

 

Articles on Vergil, Cato the Elder, Varro, and 41 other agricultural writers for Biographical Encyclopedia of Ancient Natural Scientists, ed. P. Keyser and G. Irby-Massie (Routledge, 2005), forthcoming.

 

“The Watery Something of Vergil Georgics 4.234,” CQ 54.2 (2004) 636-640.

 

“Cato’s Attacks on Scipio’s Hellenism were Pure Political Opportunism,” History

  in Dispute, P. A. Miller and C. Platter, eds. (Gale Group, 2005).  (7 pp.)

 

“Can Vergil Cry?  Epicureanism in Horace Odes 1.24,” CJ 98.3 (2003) 243-256.

 

“Optical Illusions in Ancient Greece,” in Gestures:  Essays in Greek Literature, History, and

  Philosophy, in Honor of Alan Boegehold, ed. J. Sickinger and G. Bakewell (Oxbow Books,

  2003) 136-151.

 

“The Highest Candle:  Michael C. J. Putnam as Scholar and Teacher,” in Being There Together,

 1-23 (2003).

 

“The Old Man and his Garden (Verg. Georg. 4,116-148),” MD 47 (2001) 175-195.

 

“The Hope of the Year: Vergil G. 1.224 and Hesiod Op. 617,” CP 94.2 (1999) 214-215

  (M. Hyman, co-author).

 

  Reviews

 

David Ferry, The Georgics of Virgil. Bilingual Edition.  Harvard Review (forthcoming).

 

C. J. Tuplin and T. E. Rihll, eds. Science and Mathematics in Ancient Greek Culture.  AJPh 125.1 (2004) 138-142.

 

Richard Sorabji, Emotion and Peace of Mind. From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation.

  CO 79.2 (2001) 84.

 

Adrienne Mayor, The First Fossil Hunters:  Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times. 

  CO 78.1 (2000) 46-47.

 

Richard Jenkyns, Virgil’s Experience. CO 77.3 (2000) 124-125.

 

 Work in Progress

 

The Care of the Earth: Culture in Vergil’s Georgics (book).

 

Machines in the Ancient World, M. J. Schiefsky et al, eds. (Routledge, 2007).

 

“The Enslavement of Cyzicus and Propertius 3.22” (article)

 

“Katoptron:  An Early Treatise on Reflection (Calcidius in Tim. 238-243)” (article) 

 

Presentations:

 

“Optics and Optical Science at Alexandria,”

  Symposium on Hellenistic Science, Cambridge, MA, 2006.

 

“Addressing the Powerful:  Intercessional Poetry in Augustan Rome,”

  CUNY Classics Lecture Series, New York, NY, 2006.

 

“Idols and Eye-Beams:  Ancient Theories of Vision,”

  Mellon Seminar in Ancient Studies, Lecture, Scripps College, Claremont, CA, 2005.

 

“Art vs. Nature in Ancient Rome,”

  The Maurice P. Cunningham Memorial Lecture, Lawrence University, Appleton, WI, 2004.

 

“Roman Culture:  Vergil’s Agricultural Model in the Georgics,”

  Invited Lecture, Brown University, Providence, RI, 2003.

 

“Why Euclid’s Optics is Incompatible with Linear Perspective,”                        

  History of Science Society, Annual Meeting, Denver, CO, 2001.

 

“Of Marginal Significance:  Acrostics and Allusion in Hellenistic Poetry,”

  American Philological Association, Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA, 2001.

 

“Consoling Vergil:  Horace Odes 1.24,”

  Classical Association of the Middle West and South, Annual Meeting, Knoxville, TN, 2000.

 

“Who Speaks as Aeneas Leaves the Gates of Sleep (Aen. 6.893-899)?”

  American Philological Association, Annual Meeting, Dallas, TX, 1999.

 

“Lucretius’ Palimpsest,” Intertextuality in the Ancient World,

  Graduate Student Conference, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 1998.

 

“The Death of the Old Man of Tarentum. Vergil Georgics 4.116-148 Reread,”

  American Philological Association, Annual Meeting, Chicago, IL, 1997.

 

“Idols and Eye-Beams: Two Ancient Theories of Vision,”                     

  Wellesley College Classics Club, Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, 1997.

 

Professional Experience

 

 

Organizer and Moderator for Three-Year Colloquium, “New Approaches to Ancient Science,”

  American Philological Association, 2003-2005 (Tiberiu Popa, Co-Organizer)

 

Invited Panelist, 12^th Annual Academic Affairs Faculty Symposium, Helen, GA, 2002.

 

Examiner, Georgia Junior Classical League, 2000-2002.

 

Panel Presider, Meeting of CAMWS Southern Section, 2000

 

Team Leader, Faculty Writing Workshops, UGA, 2000

 

Organizer, Department of Classics Colloquium Series, Brown University, 1998-1999

 

Organizer and Moderator for the conference “Viva Voce,” Brown University, 1997

 

Participant in the Summer Program at the American Academy in Rome, 1997

 

Participant in the excavations of the medieval abbey at San Vincenzo al Volturno, 1997

 

Service

 

Department Representative, Faculty Council, Brooklyn College 2004-present

 

Classical Studies Society Advisor, Brooklyn College, 2004-present

 

Member, Library Committee, Brooklyn College, 2005-present

 

Technology Representative, Classics Department, Brooklyn College, 2005-present

 

Member, Search Committee for Learning Center Director, Brooklyn College, 2005-present

 

Grants, Honors, and Awards:

          

History of Science Society/ National Science Foundation Travel Grant, 2001

 

Travel Grants, University of Georgia, 1999-2002

 

Franklin Postdoctoral Teaching Fellowship, University of Georgia, 1999-2002

 

Michaelides Fellowships, Brown University, 1998-1999

 

Brown University Fellowship, 1997

 

Buchanan Winthrop Latin Prize, Yale University, 1993

 

Alice Derby Lang Prize for “scholarship in classical literature,” 1993

 

Henry Edward Ellsworth Memorial Senior Essay Prize, 1993

 

Fellows Prize, Jonathan Edwards College, Yale University, 1993

 

Phi Beta Kappa, 1993

 

Buchanan Winthrop Greek Prize, Yale University, 1992

 

Richter Summer Fellowship (for translation of Aratus’ Phaenomena), 1991

 

Samuel Henry Galpin Sophomore Latin Prize, Yale University

 

Learned Associations

 

American Philological Association

Classical Association of the Midwest and South

 

Credentials:

 

Career Development Office, Brown University, Box 1907, Providence, RI 02912

 

Last updated:  September 14, 2005