Bio Sketch

Ian Morris was born in Britain. He received his undergraduate degree (in Ancient History and Archaeology) from Birmingham University and his PhD (in Classical Archaeology) from the University of Cambridge. Before coming to Stanford he taught at the University of Chicago.

Since coming to Stanford, Morris has served as chair of the Department of Classics, director of the Stanford Archaeology Center and the Social Science History Institute, and associate dean in the School of Humanities and Sciences. He has won a Dean’ s Award for Excellence in Teaching, and between 2000 and 2007 he directed Stanford’s archaeological excavations at Monte Polizzo in Sicily.

Morris has published several books on the history and archaeology of ancient Greece and long-term world history. His book Why the West Rules—For Now: The Patterns of History, and What they Reveal about the Future (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2010) was selected by Nature, the Economist, the New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Newsweek, the Independent, and the London Evening Standard as one of the best books of the year. It has won three international prizes and has been translated into eleven languages.

Morris’ current research deals with the long-term history of war and its future transformations.

Research Interests

•      World history
•      Long-term history
•      Military history
•      Ancient Greece
•      Archaeology

Books

• Why the West Rules—For Now: The Patterns of History, and What they Reveal about the Future (Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2010; translated into Chinese [simplified and complex characters], Dutch, French, German, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Turkish)
• The Greeks: History, Culture, and Society (with Barry Powell; Prentice-Hall, 2nd ed., 2009)
• The Dynamics of Ancient Empires (edited, with Walter Scheidel; Oxford 2009)
• The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco-Roman World (edited, with Walter Scheidel and Richard Saller; Cambridge 2007)
• The Ancient Economy: Evidence and Models (edited, with Joe Manning; Stanford 2005)
• Archaeology as Cultural History: Words and Things in Iron Age Greece (Blackwell 2000; translated into Spanish)
• A New Companion to Homer (edited, with Barry Powell; Brill 1997; translated into Greek)
• Democracy 2500? Questions and Challenges (edited, with Kurt Raaflaub; Kendall-Hunt 1997)
• Classical Greece: Ancient Histories and Modern Archaeologies (edited; Cambridge 1994)
• Death-Ritual and Social Structure in Classical Antiquity (Cambridge 1992; translated into Greek)
• Burial and Ancient Society (Cambridge 1987)

Forthcoming Books

• The Measure of Civilizations (Princeton 2012)
• War! What is it Good For? (Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2013)
• The Ancient World: A New History (Princeton, planned for 2016)

Archaeological Fieldwork

• Director, Stanford University excavations at Monte Polizzo, Sicily (2000-2007)
• Director, University of Chicago excavations at Kenchreai, Greece (1993-95)