Foundations of Western Civilization

Robert Oden is the President of Carleton College. He received his Bachelor’s degree in history and literature magna cum laude from Harvard University, where he was a member of Phi Beta Kappa. Dr. Oden earned a Th.M. and Ph.D. with highest distinctions at Harvard Divinity School, as well as earning the Whiting Fellowship in the Humanities. He also earned an honorary master’s degree from Dartmouth College.
Dr. Oden is the recipient of the Detur Prize, the Harvard Honorary Scholarship, and the John Harvard Honorary Scholarship. He was named Outstanding Senior Scholar, Dudley House, and was the Marshall Scholar to Cambridge University. At Cambridge, he earned an additional Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree in religious studies/theology as well as the Cambridge University Hebrew Prize and Bethune Baker Prize. He was also Elected Scholar of Pembroke College.
Formerly president of Kenyon College, his professional awards and grants include the Dartmouth College Distinguished Teaching Award and a National Endowment for the Humanities grant…

Bart D. Ehrman
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
M.Div., Ph.D., Princeton Theological Seminary

Bart D. Ehrman is the James A. Gray Professor and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he has been teaching for over 15 years. He completed his undergraduate work at Wheaton College and received his Masters of Divinity and Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary. Prior to taking his position at UNC, Professor Ehrman taught at Rutgers University…

Bonnie Wheeler
Southern Methodist University
Ph.D., Brown University


Bonnie Wheeler is Professor of English and Medieval Studies at Southern Methodist University, where she directs the Medieval Studies Program. She completed her undergraduate work at Stonehill College and received her Ph.D. from Brown University. Prior to taking her position at SMU, Professor Wheeler taught at Columbia University…

This course presents the lives, based on the latest scholarly interpretations, of four medieval women who still shimmer in the modern imagination: Heloise, the abbess and mistress of Abelard; the prophet Hildegard of Bingen; the legendary Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine; and the woman-warrior and saint, Joan of Arc.

J.M. Roberts's monumental Penguin History of the World became a publishing phenomenon and sold in the hundreds of thousands. Now he has produced an equally brilliant new book, focusing solely on our own troubled and dramatic century, and it has all the breathtaking sweep and confident judgment of his previous work.

From the Ionian Revolt to the Battle of Marathon