The Faculty Author Spotlight digital collection will be available to all Tulane affiliates and the public in an effort to celebrate the authors, promote the extensive scholarship at Tulane, and encourage cross campus scholarly conversations.
Prof. Michael Brumbaugh - FACULTY AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT 2020 Ep.12
Michael Brumbaugh recently published The New Politics of Olympos: Kingship in Kallimachos' Hymns (Oxford 2019). Brumbaugh is an Associate Professor in Classical Studies and an Affiliate in Latin American Studies. His research focuses on political thought in ancient Greek literature as well as way that literary culture has been leveraged for political ends from antiquity through to the present day. To date much of his work has focused on the role of praise in ancient political discourse. Publications such as “Kallimachos and the Seleukid Apollo” (TAPA 2016) probe the geopolitical dimensions of hymns that jointly praise divine and human greatness while “The Greek ὕμνος: High Praise For Gods And Men” (CQ 2019) examines the extent to which elites sought to share in the special praises usually associated with divine worship. His new book offers the first full-scale investigation of Kallimachos’ Hymns, the earliest surviving, author-edited poetry book in the world. This study reveals how Kallimachos used his praise poetry to shape political discourse in Greek Egypt during the reigns of the first three Ptolemaic kings, helping to secure a place for literature at the center of their dynasty for three centuries.
His next book project is a detailed study of a long-lost Latin treatise from the 18th century that compares life among the indigenous Guaraní of Paraguay to Plato’s idealized Republic in an attempt to intervene in the heated political discourse over pursuing ancient political models during the French Revolution.
Professor Brumbaugh received his PhD and MA in Classics from the University of California, Los Angeles and his AB in Greek and Latin from Colgate University. Before coming to Tulane, he taught at Princeton University, Reed College, and UCLA.