Dr. Lauren Caldwell is a lecturer in Classics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where she works on Roman social history from the Imperial period, specifically the lives of women and girls, as well as health and medicine. She has published on a variety of topics, most notably her 2015 book, Roman Girlhood and the Fashioning of Femininity. And she is currently working on a project provisionally titled “Health and Healing in the Roman Empire”. Dr. Caldwell also has a special interest in Latin pedagogy and teaches and mentors future Latin teachers at UMass Amherst.
Listen in, as Dr. Caldwell takes us through her work on puberty and girlhood and the practices that surround these life stages in the Roman Empire.
Interested in learning more? Check out these related works by Dr. Caldwell:
Caldwell, L. (2015) Roman Girlhood and the Fashioning of Femininity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Caldwell, L (2016) “Gynecology.” In G. Irby, ed., A Companion to Science, Medicine, and Technology in Ancient Greece and Rome, 360-371. New York: Wiley Blackwell.
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(attribution: M. Disdero, CC BY-SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons)
Additional Materials Related to this Podcast
Dolansky, F. (2012) “Girls, Dolls, and Adult Ideals in the Roman World.” Classical Antiquity 31: 256-292.
Harlow, M. and R. Laurence (2001) Growing Up and Growing Old in Ancient Rome. New York: Routledge.
Letts, M. (2014) “Rufus of Ephesus and the Patient’s Perspective in Medicine.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 22: 996-1020.
Olson, K. (2009) “The Appearance of the Young Roman Girl.” In J. Edmondson and A. Keith, eds., Roman Dress and the Fabrics of Roman Culture, 139-157. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
McClure, L. (2020) Women in Classical Antiquity: From Birth to Death. New York: Wiley Blackwell.
Peopling the Past 