Fairbank Professor in the Humanities
Professor of Political Science, Bryn Mawr College
Making the history of political thought speak to the present, from Herodotus and democratic Athens to how communities govern themselves today.
I'm a political theorist, and in my work I try to make the history of political thought relevant to the present. My research moves between ancient Athenian democracy and democracies today, drawing on philosophy, history and literature.
My books are Earthborn Democracy, written with Ali Aslam and David W. McIvor; Herodotus in the Anthropocene; and What Would Socrates Do? Lately I've been studying what I call the Deep Springs Model, an approach to educating leaders that brings together labor, academics and self-governance.
I grew up in Seattle, studied at Carleton College and earned my Ph.D. at Duke University. From 2010 to 2014 I held the Julian Steward Chair in the Social Sciences at Deep Springs College, and since 2014 I've taught at Bryn Mawr College, which gave me its Rosalyn R. Schwartz Award for Teaching in 2018.
Recent writing
An essay with Tommaso Bardelli, joining a growing conversation about the emerging microcollege movement.
Read the essay: An Alternative Future for Struggling CollegesBooks
Columbia University Press, with Ali Aslam and David W. McIvor
Myth and ritual as resources for an ecological and participatory democracy.
University of Chicago Press
A vision of earthly flourishing drawn from the Histories: living well within an order not entirely of your own making.
Cambridge University Press
Socrates' philosophy as a practice in democratic Athens, in conversation with the Clemente Courses and Socrates Cafés.