Classical Studies

I was born and grew up in southeast Michigan. After graduating from Ida High School, I attended Hillsdale College, where I studied classics. One of the reasons that I was interested in Latin in the first place, I think, is that my grandmother was a Latin teacher. I'd never taken Latin, so I thought I'd give it a try to fulfill my foreign language requirement. One class with Professor Jones and I was hooked. From Hillsdale, I went on to complete an M.A. and Ph.D. in classics at Bryn Mawr, and I am thrilled to be back at Hillsdale again, this time as a teacher. I am married and have two beautiful children, whom I intend to make die-hard Detroit Tigers fans.

Late Antiquity; the transformation of the Roman Empire, especially in the West, in the fourth to sixth centuries; late antique Latin poetry, and especially the rise of classical-Christian poetry (e.g., Juvencus, Prudentius, Paulinus of Nola, Sedulius); the relationship between traditional ancient culture and Christianity.

I taught a seminar in late Latin literature--specifically, Augustine's Confessions and Prudentius' Psychomachia--and it was wonderful. The students were engaged with the material to such an extent that they asked that we meet for longer periods of time than the normal three hours per week. It is exciting to see students who are being exposed to this material in Latin for the first time to be so energetic about digging more deeply into the texts we're reading. I also love to teach beginning language courses.

I haven't been here long enough to see students that I've taught as freshmen go on to do other things. But my favorite stories of success from within college life come from those students who take beginning Latin as freshmen, struggle, and are forced to drop, but who don't give up and take it again the next year and thrive. I've had more than one student for whom this was case, and it is a great encouragement.

First, it is a great honor and privilege to be the (very junior) colleague of my former (and, truth be told, current) teachers at Hillsdale. Second, I love the students here--I used to be one, after all, as did my wife Allison! But, in all seriousness, Hillsdale students are fantastic in the classroom--bright, witty, inquisitive--and have a great deal of decency about them outside of it. It is a pleasure to get to know students here and to watch them mature, both intellectually and as individuals more generally.

Choose your college carefully, because the college years are a unique and formative time in your life. If you want to enter into a challenging and rigorous intellectual partnership with your peers and teachers, Hillsdale may be a good place for you.

See above, under what I like best about the College.

ehutchinson@hillsdale.edu