Classical Studies Faculty Directory

Tom Sapsford

Assistant Professor

Profile

Tom Sapsford's research interests include performance, gender, and sexuality in both ancient Greek and Roman contexts with a specialization in imperial Latin verse. His current book project explores a figure called the kinaidos/cinaedus, who is known in antiquity for his outrageous gender performance and sexuality as well as for his distinctive style of song and dance.


Sapsford is also working on ancient writings about Greek and Roman dance and has written on adaptations of ancient literature by contemporary choreographers. Work on these research strands has been possible thorough support from the Center for Ballet and the Arts at NYU and the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama at the University of Oxford.

Publications

  • Performing the Kinaidos: Unmanly Men in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures. Oxford University Press, (2022).
  • “Epic Poetry into Contemporary Choreography: Two Twenty-First-Century Dance Adaptations of the Odyssey,” in F. Macintosh, J. McConnell, S. Harrison, and C. Kenward (eds.), Epic Performances, from the Middle Ages into the Twenty-First Century. Oxford University Press, (2018) 194–208.
  • “The Erotics of Hybridity: Transgender Representation in Powell and Pressburger’s The Tales of Hoffmann,” Spectator (2017) 37.2: 21–9.
  • “The Wages of Effeminacy? Kinaidoi in Greek Documentary Sources from Egypt,” EuGeStA (2015) 5: 103–23.