Ian Matthew Morris (born 27 January 1960) grew up in Great Britain. He attended Alleyne's comprehensive school in Stone, Staffordshire, and studied ancient history and archaeology at Birmingham University. He gained his PhD at Cambridge University .^[1] From 1987 through 1995 he taught at the University of Chicago and is now Willard Professor of Classics and Professor of History at Stanford University .^[1]

Since joining Stanford University, Morris has served as Associate Dean of Humanities and Sciences, Chair of the Classics Department, and Director of the Social Science History Institute. He was one of the founders and has served two terms as director of the Stanford Archaeology Center.^[2]

Between 2000 and 2007 he directed Stanford University’s excavation at Monte Polizzo , Sicily.^[2]

Ian Morris has been awarded fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation,^[3] National Endowment for the Humanities.,^[2] Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C.^[4] and Institute for Research in the Humanities, University of Wisconsin-Madison.^[4]

Professor Morris has published extensively on the history and archaeology of the ancient Mediterranean and on world history and in 2011 was awarded an honorary degree by De Pauw University.

His 2010 book, "Why the West Rules--For Now," compares East and West across the last 15,000 years, arguing that physical geography rather than culture, religion, politics, genetics, or great men explains Western domination of the globe. The Economist ^[5] has called it "an important book—one that challenges, stimulates and entertains. Anyone who does not believe there are lessons to be learned from history should start here." The book has been criticized by Ricardo Duchesne for offering a diffuse definition of the West which Morris envisions encompassing not only Europe but all civilizations descending from the Fertile Crescent, including Islam, and a propensity to level out fundamental differences between the development of the West and the rest.^{[6][clarification needed]} "Why the West Rules--For Now" won the 2011 PEN Center USA Literary Award for Creative Nonfiction.

Publications

• Burial and Ancient Society, Cambridge, 1987 ISBN 978-0521387385
• Death-Ritual and Social Structure in Classical Antiquity, Cambridge 1992; Greek translation, 1997 ISBN 978-0521376112
• Editor, Classical Greece: Ancient Histories and Modern Archaeologies, Cambridge, 1994 ISBN 978-0521456784
• Co-editor, with Barry Powell, A New Companion to Homer, E. J. Brill, 1997 ISBN 978-9004099890
• Co-editor, with Kurt Raaflaub, Democracy 2500? Questions and Challenges, Kendall-Hunt, 1997 ISBN 978-0787244668
• Archaeology as Cultural History, Blackwell, 2000 ISBN 978-0631196020
• The Greeks: History, Culture, and Society, with Barry Powell; Prentice-Hall, 1st ed. 2005, 2nd ed. 2009 ISBN 978-0139211560
• Co-editor, with Joe Manning, The Ancient Economy: Evidence and Models, Stanford, 2005 ISBN 978-0804757553
• Co-editor, with Walter Scheidel and Richard Saller, The Cambridge Economic History of the Greco-Roman World, Cambridge, 2007 ISBN 978-0521780537
• Co-editor, with Walter Scheidel, of The Dynamics of Ancient Empires, Oxford, 2009 ISBN 978-0195371581
• Why the West Rules - For Now: The Patterns of History, and What they Reveal About the Future, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2010; Profile, 2010 ISBN 978-0374290023

References

External links

• Ian Morris, Personal website.
• Ian Morris, Stanford University Classics Department.
• Classics and History Expert - Ian Morris, Stanford University Humanities Department.
• Why the West Rules for Now, Interview with Ian Morris in www.theglobaldispatches.com.
• Ian Morris interview on "Conversations With History," a UC Berkeley podcast and video series.

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