The UTC History Department has invited Dr. J.P. Dessel, Assistant Professor
of History and Judaic Studies at UTK, to deliver a lecture on Tuesday,
March 19, 2002 from 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. in the Signal Mountain Room of
the University Center.  The title of the lecture will be "Is the Bible
History? Origins of the Israelites from a Village Perspective." All members
of the UTC community are welcome to attend.  Refreshments will be served.

Professor Dessel specializes in the history and archaeology of the eastern
Mediterranean and the ancient Near East. His research focuses on the rise
of social complexity, urban-rural dynamics in the Bronze and Iron Ages, and
ethnicity in the ancient world. He has participated in over 25 seasons of
excavation in Israel, Egypt and North America and co-directed the
excavation of Tell el-Wawiyat in Israel. Since 1993 he directed the
excavation of Tell 'Ein Zippori in the Lower Galilee of Israel, part of the
Sepphoris Regional Project (see "Photographs from Tell 'Ein Zippori"). His
forthcoming book, Social Transformations in the Chalcolithic and Early
Bronze I of the Southern Levant, discusses the interrelationship between
craft specialization, social boundaries, and the emergence of complex
society. In addition to articles on his excavations, he has published on
the study of Early Bronze Age Levantine ceramics, the problem of
publication in Near Eastern archaeology, Chalcolithic chronology, and
Chalcolithic cult. He is currently working on vernacular architectural
traditions of the Iron Age Levan

Recent Publications
"The Relationship Between Ceramic Production and Socio-Political
Reconfiguration in Fourth Millennium Canaan." Essays in Memory of Douglas
L. Esse. Ed. S. Wolff. Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the University of
Chicago, forthcoming.

"Tell 'Ein Zippori and the Lower Galilee in the Late Bronze and Iron Ages:
A Village Perspective." Galilee Through the Centuries: Confluence of
Cultures. Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Galilee in
Antiquity. Ed. Eric Meyers, Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1999. 1-32.

[with Alexander H. Joffe] "Alternative Approaches to Early Bronze Age
Ceramics." Breaking with the Past :Ceramics and Change in the Early Bronze
of the Southern Levant. Ed. G. Phillips and D. Baird. Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, forthcoming.

Selected Honors and Awards
Jewish Studies Distinguished Scholar-In-Residence, Bucknell University,
Spring 1999
National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship, Albright Institute of
Archaeological Research, 1998-1999 (declined)




Cindy Williams
Administrative Secretary
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
History Department
408 Brock Hall, Dept. #2052
615 McCallie Avenue
Chattanooga, TN 37403
TEL: 423-755-4561
[log in to unmask]