M A R T H A . R I S S E R

The following feature story appeared in the campus publication MOSAIC in April, 1996.

Martha Risser

An archeological detective illuminates the scene of the grime

What does a site report from an archaeological excavation teach? According to classicist Martha Risser, there's more to it than simply the substance of what was found at the dig. Trinity's resident archaeologist, Professor Risser has a knack for making ancient Greek and Roman civilizations that have been dead and buried for centuries come alive, for enabling students to make connections between the study of the far-off past and their lives today, and for helping students develop critical thinking skills that can be applied in other courses and in life after Trinity.

Risser's expertise is the place where art history, literature, language, history, and anthropology intersect. While she is a specialist in archaeology and thus makes an important contribution to the classics department, Professor James Bradley '58, a colleague in the department, said that Risser is to be admired for her versatility in teaching language and literature as well. In those courses, Risser strives to help students understand and appreciate culture through original written works. "If you look at the original work, you get so much more out of it," she said. "I encourage interpretation as well as translation."

Assume nothing
In her archaeology and architecture courses, Risser often has students analyze site reports written by famous archaeologists. Despite the renown of the experts they are critiquing, students are not allowed to take anything for granted. They must separate evidence from interpretation, fact from hypothesis. Says Martin Schnabel '97, "You can't just say, 'This temple is dated to the fifth century' because she'll ask 'How do you know that?'" Risser always demands to know what about the temple or the painting scheme on a fragment of pottery gives evidence of its place or date of origin. "You almost feel like an attorney," says Schnabel. "You have to substantiate things."

Knowing that only a small number of her students go on to careers in the field of classics or archaeology, Risser hopes that these principles of critical thinking and analysis will benefit students wherever they go.

Risser's skill as a teacher, her students say, has to do with her specificity and clarity as a lecturer and with her ability to make the material relevant to students. "I try to present it so it feels real to them," she says. "I want to change the preconception that this material is far removed from their daily lives." She shows students how ancient pagan healing cults have influenced approaches to medicine today, for example, or how forms of literature that seem so modern actually have their roots in antiquity.

Having one foot in the field and one foot in the classroom gives Risser another way to make material more accessible to her students. She speaks with the authority of someone who has been to the temples and excavation sites. "She knows this information first-hand, which I know most students appreciate," says Martin Schnabel.

A flexible approach
Risser is also very flexible. When dealing with visually complex, three dimensional site plans, Risser "provides a different perspective if students don't understand the way they are presented," according to Katharine Parker '96. Parker notes that Risser's entertaining and sometimes funny stories and anecdotes of field work not only keep students interested but also help them to remember key details.
Whether she is viewed as a detective at the crime scene or an attorney making a case, Risser is really motivated by what is "know-able" and what is not. In fact, a surprising amount can be deduced from, say, a shard of pottery. In her own research, Risser has been especially interested in what pottery shards reveal about trading patterns, commerce, and cultural intermingling in the ancient world.

Despite her knowledge and experience, Risser is always willing to learn from others. Once when she was unconvinced by archaeological conclusions based on a statistical argument, a student in her course approached the problem using the methodologies she had developed in her economics courses. The student went on to do her own statistical project that substantiated, from a statistical perspective, Risser's gut reaction. Then there was the student whose questions about pottery shards and other materials grew out of analytical experiences as a chemistry major. "It was a new insight and so I started to ask those same questions in my own research," Risser said. "That's what's so rewarding about teaching at a liberal arts school."

In Caesarea, the former Palestinian seaport and excavation site where Risser teaches a summer course, she says she enjoys being "in the trenches" with her students. "They see it when I see it," she says of each new discovery. Even better, says Risser, thanks to generous permission from the Israeli government, Roman pottery can be borrowed and brought to Trinity for further study - giving students even more insight about what professional archaeologists do. "Digging is just the very beginning," notes Risser. "The bulk of the work comes after that."

- Leslie Virostek

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