Joseph A. Howley is an American academic scholar, author and social activist. He is Associate Professor of Classics at Columbia University, where his teaching and research focus on the history of reading, the social life of books, and Roman antiquarian traditions.
Howley received a Bachelor of Arts in ancient history and literature from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in 2005. He continued his studies at the University of St Andrews in Scotland earning a Master of Letters in 2007 and completing a Doctor of Philosophy in 2011. [1] [2] His doctoral thesis examined Roman antiquarianism and the cultural role of Aulus Gellius’s Noctes Atticae . [3]
Howley began his career as a Teaching Fellow in Latin and Classics Studies in the School of Classics at the University of St. Andrews. [4] [ non-primary source needed ]
Howley joined the Columbia University Department of Classics in 2011 as an assistant professor and was later promoted to associate professor. He also teaches in the university’s Core Curriculum, [1] [ non-primary source needed ] contributing to courses such as Literature Humanities and Contemporary Civilization, and is a member of Columbia's faculty senate. [5]
His first book, Aulus Gellius and Roman Reading Culture: Text, Presence and Imperial Knowledge in the Noctes Atticae, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2018. [6] [7] The volume explores how Gellius presented knowledge and identity in the Roman Empire.
In addition to his monograph, Howley published articles and book chapters on Latin literature, antiquarianism, and the history of knowledge. At Columbia, he has also supervised graduate research and collaborated on courses linking classics with intellectual history and the history of the book. [1]
Howley also serves as the secretary of the Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography at Rare Book School in Charlottesville, VA.[ non-primary source needed ]