Prof. Diane Harris Cline

Areas of Expertise

• Ancient History

Diane Harris Cline is an associate professor of history at the George Washington University, and an ancient Greek historian and classical archaeologist. In her cross-disciplinary research, she is a pioneer in the digital humanities, applying social network analysis to study the social ties in ancient Greece. Cline is the author of two books, The Treasures of the Parthenon and Erechtheion (Oxford) and The Greeks: An Illustrated History (National Geographic). She is a two-time Fulbright Scholar and  has won two NEH awards for her research in Greece, where she also serves as an expert study leader for Smithsonian Journeys and National Geographic Expeditions. With a B.A. in classics from Stanford and Ph.D. in classical archaeology from Princeton, Cline has taught a wide range of courses on Greek and Roman history, archaeology, religion, mythology, literature, and culture. She has won teaching awards at GWU, including the Columbian Prize for teaching and mentoring advanced undergraduate students in 2017 and the Morton A. Bender award for Excellence in Teaching in 2018. For her research Cline was a Fellow in Hellenic Studies at the Harvard Center for Hellenic Studies in the fall of 2018, and in spring 2019 she was a Fulbright Scholar in Greece at the University of Crete, Rethymno.

For 2020-2021, she serves as the Classics coordinator. 

Education

Ph.D., Classical Archaeology, Princeton University, 1991

M.A., Classical Archaeology, Princeton University, 1986

A.B., Classics, Stanford University, 1983

Publications

National Geographic’s The Greeks: An Illustrated History, National Geographic Press, 2016.

The Treasures of the Parthenon and the Erechtheion. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

The Aegean and the Orient in the Second Millennium, Proceedings of the 50th Anniversary Symposium, Cincinnati, 18-20 April 1997, co-edited with Eric H. Cline. Aegaeum 18. Annales s'archéologie égéenne de l'Université de Liège et UT-PASP. Liège, 1998. Co-authored "Prolegomena to the Cincinnati Conference" with Eric H. Cline.

"Social Network Analysis and Connoisseurship in the Study of Athenian Potters' Communities.” In Reconstructing Scales of Production in the Ancient Greek World: Producers, Processes, Products, People, eds. Martin Bentz and Eleni Hasaki. Heidelberg: Propylaeum, (2020): 59–80.

"Athens as a Small World." In The Ties That Bind. Ancient Politics and Network Research. Journal of Historical Network Research, eds. Wim Broekaert, Elena Köstner, and Christian Rollinger 4 (2020): 36–56.

"A Field Map for Untangling the Entangled Sea." Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology & Heritage Studies 8.3-4 (2020): 226–49.

"Entanglement, Materiality, and the Social Organization of Construction Workers in Classical Athens." Ancient History and Contemporary Social Science, eds. Mirko Canevaro, Andrew Erskine, Benjamin Gray and Josiah Ober. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press (2018): 512-528. 

"The Amarna Letters: A Web of Interaction." Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections 7:4 (2015): 58-60.

"Text Messages, Tablets, and Social Networks in the Late Bronze Age Eastern Mediterranean: The Small World of the Amarna Letters" in Egypt and the Near East: Crossroads II. Proceedings of an International Conference on the Relations of Egypt and the Near East in the Bronze Age, ed. Jana Myrnarova et al., Charles University in Prague Press (2015) 17-44. Co-authored with Eric H. Cline.

"Six Degrees of Alexander: Social Network Analysis and Ancient History." Ancient History Bulletin 26.1-2 (2012): 59-70.

Classes Taught

HIST 2006: Digital History

CLAS 2106: Mythology of the Classical World

CLAS 2107: Greek and Roman Drama

HIST 2112/CLAS 2112: History of Greece: Early Aegean and Greece to 323 BC

CLAS 2114: Sport and Society in Ancient Greece

HIST 3111: Topics in Ancient History 

HIST 3115: Topics in Ancient Art and Archaeology

HIST/CLAS 3117: Alexander the Great