Dimitrios Sparis

Bio/CV: 
I am a Ph.D. candidate in Ancient History and Mediterranean Archaeology, working with Emily Mackil, Grace Erny, and Todd Hickey. My dissertation, Polis Without a Place, examines the economic and political experience of refugees in the fourth and third centuries BCE. Drawing on epigraphy, archaeology, and literary sources, I analyze how exile and displacement reshaped the lived realities of households, the strategies they employed to survive and adapt, and the moral economies that emerged from these crises. My goal is to bring exile into broader conversations about inequality, redistribution, and the political economy of the polis, offering a household-centered perspective on mobility, property loss, and survival in contexts of instability.
My research has been supported by a Mellon–Berkeley Fellowship, the AHMA Graduate Fellowship, and multiple travel grants, including the Sara B. Aleshire Summer Travel Grant and the AHMA Travel Fund in Honor of J. K. Anderson. Fieldwork and training are central to my formation: I have served as a trench supervisor at Ancient Messene, participated in excavations at Despotiko and Vriokastraki (Kythnos), and completed epigraphical training through the Hellenic Education Research Center’s Epigraphy of the Aegean Islands Program. I also have experience applying Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) to inscriptions through the Cultural Heritage Imaging Center in San Francisco. Most recently, I participated in survey work in Attica and at Brauron through the ARTEMIS project, deepening my engagement with taskscapes and regional histories.
At Berkeley, I have taught and guided students across a range of courses in Greek history, literature, and language. In Fall 2023, I taught AGRS R44 (Classics of the Ancient Mediterranean World), which covered seminal texts of antiquity from Homer to St. Augustine; in Fall 2024, I was a Graduate Student Instructor for AGRS 10A (Introduction to Ancient Greece); and in Fall 2025, I will teach Greek 1. I hold an M.A. from the University of Chicago, where my thesis examined networks and connectivity at the sanctuary of Hekate at Lagina, and a B.A. in Classics and Physics from Cornell University.
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