Shadi bartsch biography of michael
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Her interdisciplinary synthesis was commended for illuminating gender dynamics in classical self-perception.Persius: A Study in Food, Philosophy, and the Figural (University of Chicago Press, 2015) delves into the Stoic satires of Aulus Persius, interpreting his metaphors of ingestion, digestion, and eroticism as critiques of Roman excess and calls for philosophical transformation.
She emphasizes Aeneas's internal conflicts and the epic's ambiguities, making it accessible for contemporary readers while highlighting Virgil's linguistic precision. She is married to Robert Zimmer.
Bartsch has contributed to classical scholarship, more specifically in the areas of the literature and culture of Julio-Claudian Rome, the ancient novel, Roman stoicism, and the classical tradition.
She critiqued the "two-cultures" divide, drawing on historical examples such as the fusion of economic theory and psychology in behavioral science, to call for educational reforms that integrate scientific and humanistic perspectives, as expressed in her op-ed and statements following her election to the British Academy.[30][4] Through her directorship of the University of Chicago's Institute on the Formation of Knowledge from 2015 to 2024, she promoted discipline-agnostic research involving over 50 faculty across fields, embodying this commitment to interdisciplinary knowledge production.[9]Bartsch's edited volumes on Seneca and Nero exemplify philosophical and historical interdisciplinarity by assembling contributions that contextualize these figures within broader ethical, rhetorical, and cultural frameworks beyond traditional classics.
Shadi Bartsch Explained
Shadi Bartsch (born March 17, 1966) is an American historian and professor of classics at the University of Chicago.[1] She has previously held professorships at the University of California, Berkeley[2] and Brown University where she was the professor of classics from 2008 to 2009.[3] From 2015 to 2024 she was the Director of the Institute on the Formation of Knowledge (IFK) at the University of Chicago.
Accessed 2009-01-03.
She has been appointed the Inaugural Director of the Stevanovich Institute on the Formation of Knowledge.
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Shadi Bartsch-Zimmer Elected to the British Academy | Division of the Humanities .Shadi Bartsch
Shadi Bartsch is an American classicist renowned for her scholarship on Roman imperial literature, philosophy, and the interplay between the sciences and humanities throughout history.[1] She serves as the Helen A.
Regenstein Distinguished Service Professor of Classics at the University of Chicago and was the inaugural director of the Stevanovich Institute on the Formation of Knowledge from 2015 to 2024.[1] Additionally, she edits the journal KNOW: A Journal on the Formation of Knowledge.[1]Bartsch earned her Ph.D. Bartsch traces the shift in Roman imperial contexts where seeing oneself through others' eyes—often via mirrors or spectatorship—became a tool for self-examination, linking optics, sexuality, and moral philosophy.
She analyzes texts by Tacitus, Petronius, and others to show how writers employed "doublespeak"—ambiguous language that allowed critique of tyranny while avoiding direct confrontation—and explores the psychological impact of constant theatricality on elite identity. Bartsch argues that these selective readings transform Western philosophy into tools for cultural revival and political legitimacy, revealing the classics' adaptability in non-Western contexts.
In Seneca and the Self, co-edited with David Wray, essays interrogate Senecan Stoicism's intersections with rhetoric and self-expression, debating the philosopher's innovative approaches to ethical identity in Roman society.[31] Similarly, The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero, co-edited with Kirk Freudenburg and Claretta Littlewood, integrates historical analysis of Nero's governance and architecture with philosophical and artistic interpretations, tracing his legacy across literature, religion, and politics from antiquity to the Christian era.[31] These collections underscore Bartsch's role in fostering dialogues that connect ancient history with enduring philosophical questions.[9]
Publications
Authored Books
Shadi Bartsch has authored several influential monographs in classical studies, focusing on ancient literature, philosophy, and their intersections with politics and culture.She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2007. The book was praised for revitalizing interest in the Greek novel's narrative sophistication.In Actors in the Audience: Theatricality and Doublespeak from Nero to Hadrian (Harvard University Press, 1994), Bartsch examines how imperial performances under Nero blurred the lines between stage and reality, fostering a culture of dissimulation in Roman literature and politics.
She was married to University of Chicago president and mathematician Robert Zimmer from 2011 until his death in 2023.[6]
Career
Bartsch's contributions have been to classical scholarship[7] in the areas of the literature and culture of Julio-ClaudianRome, the ancient novel, Roman stoicism, and the classical tradition.[8] More recently, Bartsch has branched out into the effect of the ancient world on our modern one, especially in Plato Goes to China: The Ancient Greeks and Chinese Nationalism. Bartsch is also the author of an acclaimed translation of Vergil's "Aeneid." She was awarded the Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in the College in 2000 and the Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching in 2006 at the University of Chicago.
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These verse translations aim to capture the intensity and rhetorical force of Seneca's dramas while providing scholarly introductions and notes.[42][43]
Awards and Honors
Major Academic Awards
Shadi Bartsch received the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Fellowship in 1999 for her project on "The Mirror of Philosophy: Specularity, Sexuality, and Self-Knowledge in Classical Literature," which explored themes central to Roman ideology and self-perception.[44]In 2000, she was awarded the Llewellyn John and Harriet Manchester Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching at the University of Chicago, recognizing her innovative approaches to classical languages and literature that engaged students through interdisciplinary lenses.[45]Bartsch earned the Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching from the University of Chicago in 2006, praised by nominators for her mentorship that fostered deep analytical skills in PhD candidates studying ancient philosophy and rhetoric.[10]She was granted a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2007 to support her research on "Philosophy and the Figural in AntiquityShadi Bartsch
Bartsch is the daughter of a UN economist and spent her childhood in London, Geneva, Tehran, Jakarta, and the Fiji Islands.
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Life
Bartsch, the daughter of a UN economist and a distant descendant of Persia's Qajar dynasty,[5] spent her childhood in London, Geneva (where she studied at the International School of Geneva), Tehran, Jakarta, and the Fiji Islands. The work has been recognized for bridging Sinology and classics in analyzing global intellectual history.[3]
Edited Volumes and Translations
Bartsch co-edited the Oxford Encyclopedia of Rhetoric in 2001, a multi-volume reference work that provides an extensive survey of rhetorical theory and practice from ancient Greece and Rome to contemporary applications across cultures and disciplines, with contributions from over 100 scholars.[33] The encyclopedia, overseen by editor-in-chief Thomas O.Sloane alongside Bartsch, Heinrich Plett, and Thomas Farrell, emphasizes interdisciplinary connections, including entries on topics like panegyric and memory in rhetorical contexts.[9]In 2005, Bartsch co-edited Erotikon: Essays on Eros, Ancient and Modern with Thomas Bartscherer, a collection of interdisciplinary essays exploring the concept of desire through lenses from ancient philosophy and literature to modern art and film.[34] Published by the University of Chicago Press, the volume draws on Western cultural traditions to analyze eros as a driving force in human expression, featuring contributions that bridge classical texts like Plato's Symposium with baroque architecture and Hollywood cinema.[35]Bartsch co-edited Seneca and the Self in 2009 with David Wray, a scholarly collection published by Cambridge University Press that examines the Stoic philosopher Seneca's ideas on identity, subjectivity, and self-formation in his philosophical and dramatic works.[36] The book includes essays addressing how Seneca's writings challenge modern notions of the autonomous self, with sections on therapeutic practices and performative aspects of identity in ancient Rome.[37]As editor of The Cambridge Companion to Seneca (2015), co-edited with Alessandro Schiesaro, Bartsch compiled a guide to Seneca's oeuvre, covering his tragedies, letters, and essays through thematic and historical analyses by leading classicists.[38] The companion highlights Seneca's influence on Renaissance and modern thought, with chapters on his political philosophy, dramatic style, and concepts of emotion and ethics.[39]Bartsch co-edited The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero in 2017 with Kirk Freudenburg and Cedric Littlewood, an interdisciplinary volume that reassesses the Julio-Claudian era under Emperor Nero through literary, historical, and archaeological perspectives.[40] Published by Cambridge University Press, it features essays on Nero's cultural patronage, the Neronian literary circle, and post-Augustan revisions of imperial narratives, challenging traditional views of the period as one of decadence.[41]Bartsch served as co-editor and translator for Lucius Annaeus Seneca: The Complete Tragedies, a two-volume series published by the University of Chicago Press.
She earned a B.A. summa cum laude from Princeton University in 1987 and a Ph.D. In examining Tacitus's Annals, she argues that the historian reveals the constructed nature of imperial ideology, where the absence of Nero exposes the fragility of Julio-Claudian myths and the gap between representation and reality.[19] Bartsch highlights how Nero's era blurred the boundaries between ruler and spectacle, as the emperor's theatrical self-presentation—such as staging murders and public performances—interchangeably merged life and art, fostering a culture of doublespeak among subjects.[20] This analysis underscores the ideological implosion of the dynasty, where historical accounts like those of Tacitus serve to critique the manipulative fictions that propped up autocratic rule.[21]A prominent theme in Bartsch's work is Roman Stoicism's conception of the self, explored through the philosophies of Seneca and Persius, where ethical formation involves internal discipline amid external corruption.
Bartsch demonstrates how such descriptions in works like Heliodorus's Aethiopica and Achilles Tatius's Leucippe and Clitophon manipulate reader expectations to create suspense and irony, challenging traditional views of ancient fiction as mere entertainment. She won an ACLS Fellowship in 1999[9] and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2007.[10] She served as chair of the Faculty Board of the University of Chicago Press from 2006 to 2008[11] and editor-in-chief of both Classical Philology and KNOW.