Dr. John Ma

Biography

John Ma is a professor in the Department of History at Columbia University, specializing in Ancient History, particularly in Greek and Hellenistic Greek epigraphy. He has a significant background in material culture and historical geography and joined the department in 2015 after spending fifteen years at Corpus Christi College, Faculty of Classics at Oxford. He has also worked in the Classics Department at Princeton during his time living in New York. Ma received his B.A. in Literae Humaniores and his D.Phil. in Ancient History from Oxford University. His research interests focus on the history of the ancient Greek world within a broader context, encompassing the ancient Near East. He is particularly interested in the handling of epigraphical and archaeological evidence and the complexities of the Hellenistic world. His scholarly work aims to combine philological attentiveness with interpretive awareness grounded in the material realities of legal, social, and economic life. Among his notable publications are "Antiochos III Cities of Western Asia Minor" (2nd ed. 2002) and "Statues of Cities: Honorific Portraits and Civic Identity in the Hellenistic World" (rev. ed. 2015).

Research Interests