James Razumoff - Alison M. Frantz Fellow

James Razumoff (he/they) is a PhD Candidate in the Mediterranean Art & Archaeology program of the University of Virginia’s Art Department. He is an archaeologist of the Medieval Roman (Byzantine) empire, focusing on urban change and human-environment relations in the Early Medieval (6th to 9th centuries CE) period. James’ dissertation, “Political Ecology of the Eastern Roman City (6th to 9th centuries CE)”, explores how non-elite responses to environmental disasters, such as earthquakes and silting of harbors, lead to emergence of new architectural and political forms in the empire’s cities.

During his time at the Gennadius, James hopes to conduct ecocritical readings of textual sources informing his dissertation (saints’ lives, travelogues, historical maps and engravings), both tracking depictions of environmental phenomena and analyzing how they were framed through discourses on political and religious power.