Jeremy Simmons

@caeliambulator.bsky.social

Ancient historian @UChicago. Author of Sea of Treasures: A Cultural History of Ancient Indian Ocean Trade (2026). More than occasionally talks about the doggo. Opinions my own.

@caeliambulator.bsky.social

Excited to start teaching a course on Roman luxury next week (couldn't resist the pun in the title 😅). Going with a course pack—thanks AI—which has me nostalgic for my own time in undergrad. Encouraged to see those on the semester system are finding more engagement with the analog approach!

Poster for course @uchicagohistory.bsky.social. Background image is a wall painting from the Villa of P. Fannius Synistor, Boscoreale, Italy, c. 50 BCE (MMA 03.14.13): it depicts a bejeweled column in the foreground and a vine-laden gazebo on a rocky outcrop in the background. Text reads: Prof. Jeremy Simmons | HIST/CLCV 21015 | TuTh 2–3:20pm | Did decadence doom the Roman Empire? | FIAT LUXUS: Luxury and its Discontents in the Roman World
@bretdevereaux.bsky.socialReposted by @caeliambulator.bsky.social

But I cannot stress enough: we have spent decades de-prioritizing and defunding the humanities broadly in secondary and post-secondary education and then we're all surprised-Pikachu-face when we are suffering from systematic leadership failures in exactly those skills and knowledge domains.

@kawulf.bsky.socialReposted by @caeliambulator.bsky.social

After reading some of the recent pubs and discourse around US higher ed.
 I should just stop right here. But here are the three major fallacies of much of what’s out there, three contexts that are missing, and the one big thing that is driving me around the bend (actually already there, but). 1/

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