Links
Areas of expertise
Biography
I have been the Professor of Ancient Languages and Culture at the University of Turku since 2003. I studied classical languages at the University of Turku, and obtained my doctorate in 2000. The Finnish Institute in Rome has become familiar to me as a member of the research team, and as a visiting fellow. I am the head of the Department of Classics, and presently also the Department of Italian language and the Department of Spanish. For 2001-2006 I worked as the deputy director of the School of Classical and Romance Languages, 2007-2009 as its director, and 2009-2017 as the deputy director of the School of Languages and Translation Studies. I have been a member of the Faculty Council of the Faculty of Humanities continuously since 2004. I was the Chairman of the Board of the Library of the University of Turku for 2005-2009. At present, I belong also to the management group of TUCEMEMS.
I have been a member of the Executive Board of the local chapter of The Finnish Union of University Professors since 2010, and its Secretary and Liaison Manager since 2012, and a member of the Union Council since 2015.
Research
My research has focused particularly on Greek and Roman historiography and antiquarians; especially what and how they talk about the political and religious institutions of the Republic of Rome. I am also involved with the interdisciplinary Orationes project led by Anthony Johnson (Professor of English at the Åbo Akademi University). The aim is to bring an important unpublished Early Modern manuscript preserved in the archive of Canterbury Cathedral into the scholarly arena. It was collected by George Lovejoy (c.1675), Headmaster of King's School, Canterbury, after the English Civil War, and it is one of the most substantial sources of the English school drama from the period.