The Department of Classics at Florida State University is the oldest in Florida and has emerged as one of the leading centers of classical studies in the southeast. The faculty in Classics is distinguished in teaching and research. Several members of the faculty have received university and national teaching awards. The department boasts special strengths in many areas of classical studies. The Department also plays an important role in training Latin teachers for the schools.

The Department offers students the intimacy of a small liberal arts college in the midst of a large state university. There is an enthusiastic community of approximately 80 majors and 45 graduate students. There are a variety of student organizations, including the Archaeology Club, Eta Sigma Phi, and the Senior Classical League. The Department sponsors excavations at Cetamura del Chianti in Italy, in which students regularly participate and earn undergraduate and graduate credit.

Every academic year the department hosts the Hunter lecture in the Fall and two major conferences: In the Fall, it is the Langford Seminar; in the Spring, it is the Langford Conference. Recent topics of the Seminar have included: Roman Elegy, Athens in Augustan Greece, Greek and Roman Epigram, Hymns in Graeco-Roman Antiquity, and The Love of Language.This year, the Langford Seminar is devoted to Grammar and Rhetoric in Roman Poetry. Each Spring, the department hosts the Langford Family Eminent Scholar in Classics, who offers a seminar in his or her speciality and who hosts an academic conference devoted to his or her research interests. Past Langford Scholars include Michael Jameson, William S. Anderson, Robin Seager, Brunilde Ridgway, Anne Burnett, Erika Simon, Elaine Fantham, Peter Rhodes, and Alan Boegehold. The 2006 Langford Scholar was Alan Shapiro. Recent topics of the Langford Conference have included: Caesar Versus Liberty, Approaches to Athenian Democracy, Aristotle and Horace, What's So Funny?, From Nippur to Delphi, Greek Self-Fashioning: Alcibiades to Menander, and Political Economies of the Aegean Bronze Age. The topic of the Langford Conference '08 is Health and Sickness in Ancient Rome: Medicine, Metaphor, and Manipulation .

You will find a good deal of information about our department on this website. However, if you wish to inquire further about any aspect of our program, please do not hesitate to contact our Director of Undergraduate Studies, Dr. John Marincola, or our Director of Graduate Studies, Dr. James Sickinger. If you have questions about applying to our graduate program, please contact the Director of Admissions, Dr. Nancy de Grummond.