I earned a Bachelor's of Science in Business Management / International Finance, with a minor in Accounting and Economics from the Marriott School of Business at BYU. After a decade in the corporate world, I returned to school and earned my M.A. (1999) and Ph.D. (2003) in Ancient History from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA, from the interdisciplinary Graduate Group in Ancient History. While there I studied Greek and Roman history and historiography from the original sources in Greek and Latin, as well as the material culture of the Greeks and Romans (archaeology and urban topography; commemorative art and epigraphy; economy and numismatics).

My main focus is on the political culture of the Roman Republic (509 to 31 BCE). This includes examinations of: elected officers who administered Rome and its growing empire; participation (theoretical and actual) of citizens in governance, i.e., through legislation, elections and unofficial political activity; the increase of individual competition and civic violence in politics; and the rise of autocratic rulers, e.g., Caesar, Augustus and their successors in the waning days of the Republic. I have published a number of articles on aspects of Roman political culture, topography, numismatics as well as Vergil's presentation of Rome, Romans and Roman landscapes in the Aeneid. I also have a book under contract with Cambridge University Press on The Tribunes of the Plebs in the Roman Republic (494-31 BCE).

I enjoy engaging students in learning about the literature, material culture, and social-cultural constructs of ancient societies. I regularly teach upper-level courses on Greek and Roman history, and graduate-level courses on the Roman city, Augustan Rome, and Race and Ethnicity in the Ancient Mediterranean (not to mention several sections of "Western Civ. to 1648", soon to be replaced by "World History to 1500").  My hope is to offer, over time, a wider variety of courses on the ancient world so that students with in interest in the civilizations and cultures of antiquity may broaden their knowledge and deepen their appreciation of human ingenuity and achievements in the remote past. While at Penn (1997-2004) and Temple University (2004-2012) I also taught all levels of Latin, and hope to encourage the burgeoning interest in Latin at WKU so that I may offer courses on ancient Roman historians (Caesar, Sallust, Tacitus, etc.) in the original language.