The Department of Classics will welcome Professor Melissa Haynes to Madison next fall as the first UW-Madison American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) New Faculty Fellow.
Haynes recently taught at Temple University (Philadelphia) in both the Department of Greek and Roman Classics and in the Intellectual Heritage Program.
She earned her PhD in Classical Philology from Harvard University, and held a postdoctoral fellowship in the Mellon Modeling Interdisciplinary Program at Washington University in St. Louis from 2008-2010.
Her research and teaching focuses on gender, sexuality and the interconnections between word and image.
While at UW-Madison, Haynes plans to finish her current book project that investigates the literary aesthetics of the statue and how the written statue offers a unique perspective on the material, visual and literary culture of the Roman Empire.
She will also be able to complete the final editing for a commentary and translation of a 19th century sexological treatise written in Latin that is an early example of the then emerging study of sexuality.
The ACLS New Faculty Fellowship will also provide her with the time and resources to begin research and writing on a new project on texts from the 2nd-4th centuries CE that borrow the voice and perspective of the prostitute to comment on contemporary culture, gender relations, rhetoric and philosophy.
As part of her time UW-Madison, she will also be teaching courses in the Department of Classics.