
Contact Information
Fields of Interest
Biography

I am broadly interested in Greek cultural and social history, with a particular focus on slavery, gender, and sexuality.
My first book, Status in Classical Athens (Princeton University Press, 2013), maps a spectrum of ten social and legal statuses in classical Athens, questioning the ideology of three neatly defined status groups—slave, metic (resident foreigner), and citizen—so commonly found in both ancient Greek literature and modern classical scholarship. In my second book, Insults in Classical Athens (University of Wisconsin Press, 2020), I examine the range of insults in Athens from benign mockery to serious affronts. My third book, Greek Slavery (De Gruyter, 2023), surveys recent scholarly trends and controversies in the field of Greek slavery studies and suggests future directions for research.
I have also written commentaries on Isaeus' Orations 2 and 6 (Bryn Mawr Commentaries 2000) and Pseudo-Demosthenes' Against Neaira (Dickinson Classical Commentaries, online 2018; print book 2021) and co-edited (with C. W. Marshall) a volume entitled Slavery and Sexuality in Classical Antiquity (University of Wisconsin Press, 2021).
For many years I served as co-chair of the Lambda Classical Caucus, a coalition of LGBTQ Classicists and their allies affiliated with the Society for Classical Studies.
Research
Selected Research
- Deborah Kamen. Greek Slavery. Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter 2023.
- Deborah Kamen and Sarah Levin-Richardson. "Approaching Emotions and Agency in Greek and Roman Slavery." In Les lectures contemporaines de l’esclavage: problématiques, méthodologies et analyses depuis les années 1990. Ed. A. Pałuchowski. Bescançon: Presses universitaires de Franche-Comté, 2022. 25-45.
- Sarah Levin-Richardson and Deborah Kamen. “Epigraphy and Critical Fabulation: Imagining Narratives of Greco-Roman Sexual Slavery.” In Dynamic Epigraphy: New Approaches to Inscriptions. Ed. E. Cousins. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2022. 201-221.
- Deborah Kamen and C.W. Marshall, eds. Slavery and Sexuality in Classical Antiquity. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2021.
- Deborah Kamen. Insults in Classical Athens. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press: 2020.
- Deborah Kamen. Pseudo-Demosthenes: Against Neaira. Carlisle, PA: Dickinson College Commentaries: 2018.
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Deborah Kamen, "The Consequences of Laughter in Aeschines' Against Timarchos." Archimède: Archéologie et histoire ancienne 5 (2018) 49-56.
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- Deborah Kamen. "Manumission and Slave-Allowances in Classical Athens." Historia 65.4 (2016) 413-26
- Sarah Levin-Richardson and Deborah Kamen. "Lusty Ladies in the Roman Imaginary." In Ancient Sex: New Essays. Eds. R. Blondell and K. Ormand. Columbus: Ohio State University, 2015. 231-252.
- Sarah Levin-Richardson and Deborah Kamen. “Revisiting Roman Sexuality: Agency and the Conceptualization of Penetrated Males.” In Sex in Antiquity: Exploring Gender and Sexuality in the Ancient World. Eds. M. Masterson, N. Rabinowitz, and J. Robson. Routledge, 2015. 449–460.
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Deborah Kamen. "Kina[i]dos: A Pun in Demosthenes' On the Crown?" CQ 64.1 (2014) 405-8
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Deborah Kamen. "Sale for the Purpose of Freedom: Slave-prostitutes and Manumission in Ancient Greece," CJ 109.3 (2014) 281-307.
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- Deborah Kamen. "Slave-prostitutes and ἐργασία in the Delphic Manumission Inscriptions," ZPE 188 (2014) 149-53.
- Deborah Kamen. "The Manumission of Socrates: A Rereading of Plato’s Phaedo." Classical Antiquity 32 (2013): 78-100.
- Deborah Kamen. Status in Classical Athens. Princeton: Princeton University Press: 2013.
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Deborah Kamen. "Naturalized Desires and the Metamorphosis of Iphis." Helios 39 (2012): 21-36.
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- Deborah Kamen. "Manumission, Social Rebirth, and Healing Gods in Ancient Greece." D. Geary and S. Hodkinson, eds., Slaves and Religions in Graeco-Roman Antiquity and Modern Brazil. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars: 2012. 174-194.
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Deborah Kamen. "Reconsidering the Status of khôris oikountes." Dike 14 (2011): 43-53.
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- Deborah Kamen. "Slave Agency and Resistance in Martial." R. Alston, E. Hall, and L. Proffitt, eds., Reading Ancient Slavery. London: Bristol Classical Press: 2011. 192-203.
- Deborah Kamen. "A Corpus of Inscriptions: Representing Slave Marks in Antiquity." Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome 55 (2010): 95-110.
- Deborah Kamen. "Servile Invective in Classical Athens." Scripta Classica Israelica 28 (2009): 43-56.
- Deborah Kamen. "The Life Cycle in Archaic Greece." H. A. Shapiro, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Archaic Greece. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 2007. 85-107.
- Deborah Kamen. Isaeus’ Orations 2 and 6. Bryn Mawr: Bryn Mawr Commentaries: 2000.
Research Advised: Graduate Dissertations
- Zainab Hassan Syed, The Ghost of Slavery: A Closer Examination of Freed People in Classical Athens, MA Thesis, 2023.
- Sarah Brucia Breitenfeld, 'Someone Get a Whip!' Enslaved Women and Violence in Athenian Oratory, Comedy, and Curses. Diss., 2022.
- Richard Fernando Buxton. "A Model of Conflict: the Metonymic Function of Stasis in Xenophon's Hellenica." Diss., 2010.
Research Advised: Undergraduate Senior Essays
- Kelsey Flores, "Bastards in Classical Athens," Senior Essay 2022
- Jocelyn Harlan. "Women in Classical Athenian Law Courts." Senior Essay, 2021.
- Anita Chen. "Life of a Foreign Prostitute in Athens." Senior Essay, 2020.
- Sierra Rasmussen. "'The Intimacy of your Thighs'." Senior Essay, 2019.
- William McInnis. "Slavery from Antiquity to Modern History: Common Threads." Senior Essay, 2018.
- Rebekka Nicholson. "The Acquisitional Art of Angling." Senior Essay, 2018.
- Michelle Darci. "Women's Roles and Funeral Rites in Ancient Athens." Senior Essay, 2012.
Courses Taught
Winter 2024
Spring 2023
Winter 2023
Summer 2022 Full-term
Spring 2022
Winter 2022
Winter 2021
Spring 2020
Winter 2019
Spring 2018
Winter 2018
Autumn 2017
Spring 2017
Winter 2017
Autumn 2016
Spring 2016
Winter 2016
Spring 2014
Winter 2014
Autumn 2013
Spring 2013
Winter 2013
Autumn 2012
Winter 2012
Affiliations
News & Events
Related News
- UW at SCS/AIA 2023! - December 19, 2022
- Chair’s Letter, Autumn 2022 - September 8, 2022
- Chair's Letter, Autumn 2021 - September 3, 2021
- Chair's Letter, Autumn 2020 - November 7, 2020
- UW at the SCS/AIA/NACGLE (2020)! - December 16, 2019
- UW Classics at the SCS/AIA! - December 1, 2017
- Professors Kamen and Levin-Richardson win national research award - January 19, 2017
- Feminism and Classics VII: Visions - May 27, 2016
- UW hosts seventh international conference on Feminism and Classics May 19-22 - May 15, 2016
- Feminism and Classics VI - June 1, 2012
Related Events
- Q&A Session about UW Classics Graduate Programs - December 11, 2023 - 11:00am
- Q&A with UW Classics (Virtual Session for Admitted Students & Families) - April 17, 2023 - 5:00pm
- Information session for Admitted and Prospective Students - April 13, 2021 - 6:00pm
- Insults in Classical Athens (annual AIA Faculty Lecture) - February 20, 2021 - 2:00pm
- Rescheduled for March 17,2018: Freedom in the Ancient World: 2018 Annual Conference for Teachers - March 17, 2018 - 8:30am
- Visions: Feminism and Classics VII - May 19, 2016 to May 22, 2016