Ian Oliver

Ian Oliver received his Ph.D. in Classics from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2017. His dissertation, entitled The Audiences of Herodotus: The Influence of Performance on the Histories, reexamined large sections of the Histories—the first work of its kind, and properly termed the ‘invention’ of History—by attempting to identify their original performance context. A manuscript based on his dissertation is currently under contract with Lexington Press, due out in Fall 2024; an article-length version of the first chapter was published in The Classical Journal in 2021. Ian's current academic projects include scholarly contributions to the From Troy to Baghdad project, edited and organized by Roberta Stewart; an article on Julius Caesar and his views of Republicanism, especially as it applies to Caesar’s work on the Civil Wars; and a contribution to the Havard Center for Hellenic Studies' Plataea 2.5k volume, edited and organized by Natasha Bershadsky, entitled “The 'Other' Greeks and the Plataea Narrative’s Compositional Context.”

Ian primarily teaches the Latin and Greek languages, but has also taught a wide variety of other courses related to Classical Greece and Rome including courses on the literatures, mythology, history and sexualities of the ancient world. He also teaches a course entitled "Of Monsters and Mercenaries" for the Regis First Year Experience Program, as well as a comparative literature course on biblical narrative entitled "Hacking the Bible" for the Regis Integrative Core.