About
I am a cultural historian of the Mediterranean world in late antiquity and the early middle ages. My research and teaching focus on the later Roman Empire and its early medieval successors, with a particular interest in issues of religious diversity, social identity, ethnic communities, and political culture. My first book, Being Christian in Vandal Africa (University of California Press, 2018) was about the consequences of church conflict in post-Roman Africa (modern-day Tunisia and Algeria). I am just finishing a project on the ways in which Christian ideology reshaped the representation and practice of governance in late antiquity.
I have spent most of my life on Merseyside: I grew up on the Wirral and moved to Liverpool in January 2018 to join the Department. But my journey in between was slightly longer than a trip across the Mersey: I first did a BA in History and then an MSt in Late Antique and Byzantine Studies in Oxford, before moving to Cambridge for a PhD in Classics (which included Erasmus doctoral study at the Universität zu Köln). I then went back to Oxford to take up a research fellowship at Brasenose College and The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities (TORCH), with a stint as a temporary Departmental Lecturer in Early Medieval History at Balliol College, Brasenose College and St Peter’s College thrown in for good measure.
I am very happy to supervise MA and PhD dissertations and mentor post-doctoral projects on late ancient, early medieval, and early Byzantine topics. If you’d like to work with me, please send me an e-mail and we can talk about your project.