Kate Cooper (born 1960) is a

Professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...

History History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...

and former head of the History Department at

Royal Holloway, University of London Royal Holloway, University of London (RHUL), formally incorporated as Royal Holloway and Bedford New College, is a public research university and a constituent college of the federal University of London. It has six schools, 21 academic departm ...

, a role to which she was appointed in September 2017 and she stood down in 2019. She was previously Professor of Ancient History and Head of the Department of Classics and Ancient History at the

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

, where she taught from 1995.

Early life and education

Cooper was born in 1960 in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

She gained a BA in English Literature from

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a Private university, private liberal arts college, liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a Men's colleges in the United States, men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Epis ...

in 1982, and an M.T.S. in Scripture and Interpretation from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in 1986. She was awarded her doctorate for the thesis 'Concord and Martyrdom: Gender, Community, and the Uses of Christian Perfection in Late Antiquity' from the Department of the Study of Religion,

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, in 1992. Her supervisor was Peter Brown. She is known by and publishes under the name Kate Cooper.

Career

Cooper held a

Leverhulme Trust The Leverhulme Trust () is a large national grant-making organisation in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1925 under the will of the 1st Viscount Leverhulme (1851–1925), with the instruction that its resources should be used to suppo ...

Major Research Fellowship (2012–15) for a project on 'The Early Christian Martyr Acts: A New Approach to Ancient Heroes of Resistance'. Her research interests are the cultural, social, and religious history of late Roman society, focusing particularly on the Christianization of Roman elites, and on daily life and the Roman family, religion and gender, social identity, and the fall of the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...

. Other major fellowships and prizes she has held include a

Research Councils UK Research Councils UK, sometimes known as RCUK, was a non-departmental public body which coordinated science policy in the United Kingdom from 2002 to 2018. It was an umbrella organisation that coordinated the seven separate research councils tha ...

Fellowship to investigate the role of violence in early Christianity during the century before and after the reign of

Constantine the Great Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to Constantine the Great and Christianity, convert to Christiani ...

, asking what was distinctive about the Christian approach to violence, and the role of violence in establishing identities and boundaries between communities (2009–12); and the

Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at the academy. Prizes have been awarded annually since 1921, with a hiatus ...

(1990-1). She was a Summer Fellow at

Dumbarton Oaks Dumbarton Oaks, formally the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, is a historic estate in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It was the residence and garden of wealthy U.S. diplomat Robert Woods Bliss and his wife, M ...

in 1998. Her project was “The Roman Cult of Eastern Martyrs, 400–700”. She is a regular contributor to print and broadcast media in the US and UK, and blogs about her work.

Critical reception of work

Her work has been described as 'ambitious', 'valuable', and 'noteworthy'. ''Band of Angels'' was reviewed in the ''

New Statesman The ''New Statesman'' is a British political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney and Beatrice Webb and other leading members ...

'', which said: "Her book is characterised by a scholarly seriousness and the disarmingly unapologetic way she links the personal, the political and the institutional. Avoiding clichés, she excavates the experiences of a wide range of women, letting them speak for themselves. Strikingly, she also refers to her own experiences." The work was described as '‘the best kind of popular history.’ A more mixed view was taken in a review in ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally. It was fo ...

'', which found "Cooper has written a highly readable and important work of the history of religion. She wears her evident scholarship lightly, but the text is suffused with personal, imaginative and emotional perspectives. From the prologue, with its memories of her childhood and her mother, to the epilogue's fictitious portrayal of a virgin mother at the Council of Chalcedon in the fifth century, she abandons the detachment of the professional historian. While this can work well in the realms of human history, it seems to me problematic in the domain of religious history. This fine book, in other words, left me wondering whether Prof Cooper wasn’t having her faith claims and eating them." A ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' review said the book was "as much an exercise in historical detective work as anything else, an act of reading between and behind the lines, rescuing these lost women from ancient sources, assessing their influence, and placing their lives in a broader social and historical context."

Works

Journal articles and book chapters

* 'Christianity, Private Power, and the Law from Decius to Constantine: The Minimalist View', ''

Journal of Early Christian Studies The ''Journal of Early Christian Studies'' is an academic journal founded in 1993 and is the official publication of the North American Patristics Society. It is devoted to the study of patristics, that is Christianity in the ancient period of roug ...

'' 19 (2011), 327-43 * 'The Long Shadow of Constantine', ''

Journal of Roman Studies The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies (The Roman Society) was founded in 1910 as the sister society to the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies. The Society is the leading organisation in the United Kingdom for those intereste ...

'' (2014) * 'Martyrdom, Memory, and the "Media Event": Visionary Writing and Christian Apology in Second-Century Christianity', in Dominic Janes and Alex Houen (eds), ''Martyrdom and Terrorism: Pre-Modern to Contemporary Perspectives'' (Oxford:

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world, and its printing history dates back to the 1480s. Having been officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, 2014), 23-39 * 'Religion, Conflict, and "The Secular": The View From Early Christianity', in John Wolffe and Gavin Moorhead, ''Religion, Security, and Global Uncertainties'' (Milton Keynes:

Open University The Open University (OU) is a British public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by number of students. The majority of the OU's undergraduate students are based in the United Kingdom and principally study off- ...

, 2014),13-15 * 'Relationships, Resistance, and Religious Change in the Early Christian Household', in John Doran,

Charlotte Methuen Charlotte Mary Methuen, (born 1964) is a British Anglican priest, historian, and academic. Since 2017, she has been Professor of Church History at the University of Glasgow. As an academic she specialises in the Reformation in Germany, 20th-centur ...

, and

Alexandra Walsham Alexandra Marie Walsham (born 4 January 1966) is an English-Australian academic historian. She specialises in early modern Britain and in the impact of the Protestant and Catholic reformations. Since 2010, she has been Professor of Modern Histo ...

, eds., ''Religion and the Household'' (Woodbridge,

Boydell Press Boydell & Brewer is an academic press based in Woodbridge, Suffolk, England, that specializes in publishing historical and critical works. In addition to British and general history, the company publishes three series devoted to studies, edition ...

, 2014), 5-22 * The Heroine and the Historian: Procopius of Caesarea on the Troubled Reign of Queen Amalasuentha, From Jonathan J. Arnold, M. Shane Bjornlie, and Kristina Sessa, eds, ''A COMPANION TO OSTROGOTHIC ITALY'' (Leiden:

Brill Brill may refer to: Places * Brielle (sometimes "Den Briel"), a town in the western Netherlands * Brill, Buckinghamshire, a village in England * Brill, Cornwall, a small village to the west of Constantine, Cornwall, UK * Brill, Wisconsin, an un ...

, 2016), 296-315 * 'The Bride of Christ, the 'Male Woman,' and the Female Reader in Late Antiquity', in Judith Bennett and Ruth Mazo Karas, eds., ''The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 529-44 * 'A Father, a Daughter, and a Procurator: Authority and Resistance in the Prison Memoir of Perpetua of Carthage', ''

Gender and History ''Gender & History'' is an international academic journal. It is an important academic journal for articles relating to the history of femininity, masculinity, and gender relations. The current editors are Rosemary Elliot, Maud Bracke, James Simps ...

'' 23 (2011), 686-703 * 'Gender and the Fall of Rome', in Philip Rousseau, ed., ''A Companion to Late Antiquity'' (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009) * 'Insinuations of Womanly Influence: An Aspect of the Christianization of the Roman Aristocracy,' ''Journal of Roman Studies'' 82 (1992), 113-27 * 'The Voice of the Victim: Gender, Representation, and Early Christian Martyrdom,' ''

Bulletin of the John Rylands Library The ''Bulletin of the John Rylands Library'' is a journal published by Manchester University Press. Articles are meant to enhance the "scholarship and understanding" of the collections of the John Rylands Library. The journal was established in ...

'' 80:3 (1998), 147-57 * 'All You Need is Love' (review of Karen Armstrong, St Paul: The Misunderstood Apostle), ''

The Literary Review ''The Literary Review'' is an American literary magazine founded in 1957. The biannual magazine is published internationally by Fairleigh Dickinson University in Madison, New Jersey. In addition to the publication of short stories, poems, and ...

'', November 2015 (Issue 437), p. 21 * 'Closely Watched Households: Visibility, exposure, and private power in the Roman domus', '' Past and Present'' 197 (Nov. 2007), 3-33 * 'Conversion, Conflict, and the Drama of Social Reproduction: Narratives of Filial Resistance in Early Christianity and Modern Britain', in Brigitte Secher Bøgh, ed., ''Conversion and Initiation in Antiquity: Shifting Identities - Creating Change'' (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2015), 169-83 * 'Ventriloquism and the Miraculous: Conversion, Preaching, and the Martyr Exemplum in Late Antiquity,' in Kate Cooper and Jeremy Gregory, eds., ''Signs, Wonders, and Miracles'' (Studies in Church History vol. 41, Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2005), 22-45 * 'A Saint in Exile: The Early Medieval Thecla at Rome and Meriamlik', '' Hagiographica'' 2 (1995), 1-23 * 'Augustine and Monnica', in Conrad Leyser and Lesley Smith, eds., ''Motherhood, Religion, and Society in Medieval Europe'', 400-1400 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2011), 7-20 * 'The Martyr, the matrona and the Bishop: Networks of Allegiance in Early Sixth-Century Rome,' ''Early Medieval Europe'' 8:3 (1999), 297-317

Monographs

* ''Band of Angels: The Forgotten World of Early Christian Women'' 2013 * ''The Fall of the Roman Household'' 2007 * ''The Virgin and the Bride: idealized womanhood in late antiquity'' 1996

Edited Volumes

* Kate Cooper and Conrad Leyser, ''Making Early Medieval Societies: Conflict and Belonging in the Latin West, 300-1200'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016) * Kate Cooper and

Julia Hillner Julia Hillner is Professor for Dependency and Slavery Studies at the University of Bonn. She was previously Professor of Medieval History at the University of Sheffield. She is an expert on late antiquity, applying digital methods of social netw ...

(eds.), ''Religion, dynasty, and patronage in early Christian Rome, 300-900'', c.2007

Media

* ''

Cunk On Earth ''Cunk on Earth'' is a British mockumentary television series produced by Charlie Brooker. The series stars Diane Morgan as Philomena Cunk, an ill-informed investigative reporter, a character who previously starred on ''Charlie Brooker's Weekly ...

'' - Episode 2, interviewee. Netflix, released February 2023 * In Our Time, BBC Radio Four, on early Christian martyrdom, aired 28 April 2022. With

Candida Moss Candida R. Moss (born 26 November 1978) is an English public intellectual, journalist, New Testament scholar and historian of Christianity, who is the Edward Cadbury Professor of Theology in the Department of Theology and Religion at the Universi ...

and James Corke-Webster * In Our Time, BBC Radio Four, on Augustine and The Confessions, aired 15 March 2018. With

Morwenna Ludlow Morwenna Ann Ludlow (born 1970) is a British historian, theologian, and Anglican priest, specialising in historical theology. She is Professor of Christian History and Theology at the University of Exeter. She is known in particular for her work on ...

and Martin Palmer * CNN: Finding Jesus 2 (six-part documentary programme; airs Easter 2017); interviewee (all episodes) * BBC ONE: The Big Questions: Featured Guest (17 May 2015, "Is God the Problem?") * BBC ONE: The Big Questions: Featured Guest (8 March 2015, "Is it More Important to do Good than to do God?") * BBC iwonder: Why didn't Christianity Die out in the 1st Century? * CNN: Finding Jesus (six-part documentary programme; Easter 2015); interviewee (episodes on Mary Magdalene, The Apostle James, The Empress Helena) and historical consultant (episode on the Empress Helena, aired Easter 2015) * National Geographic Channel: The Jesus Mysteries (aired 19, 20 & 21 April 2014) * The Guardian (11 February 2014) * Premier Christian Radio: Maria Rodriguez-Toth interviewing Kate Cooper, Woman to Woman (31 December 2013) * TRUNEWS Radio: Rick Wiles interviewing Kate Cooper (13 September 2013) * Have Women Been Airbrushed from Church History? Interview With Kate Cooper’ (4 October 2013) * BBC Radio 4: "The Ideas that Make Us: Love" (Bettany Hughes interview with Kate Cooper, Wednesday, 18 September 2013) * BBC Radio 4: "Every Generation Within Christianity Has Had Female Leaders" – Kate Cooper from Manchester University Talks About Her New Book (Clip of William Crawley interviewing Kate Cooper on Sunday, 11 August 2013) * Study: Women Influential in Early Christianity Have Been ‘Airbrushed’ From History, Profile by Katie Collins for wired.co.uk (9 August 2013) * ‘Christians airbrushed women out of history’, University of Manchester Press Release for Band of Angels: The Forgotten World of Early Christian Women (9 August 2013) * RTÉ 1 (Ireland): Today with Pat Kenny. Pat Kenny Interview with Kate Cooper, (30 July 2013) * NewsTalk (Ireland): Moncrieff. Sean Moncrieff Interviewing Kate Cooper, (30 July 2013, at minute 34) * A Different Kind of Family Debate (article by Kate), The Huffington Post (29 June 2013) * BBC Radio 4: In Our Time: episode: Queen Zenobia (hosted by Melvin Bragg, with Kate Cooper, Edith Hall, Richard Stoneman, 30 May 2013) * A Week in December Revisited, article by Kate Cooper, The Huffington Post (26 April 2013) * National Geographic Channel: Jesus: The Rise to Power (Clip of interview with Kate Cooper on the Great Persecution, aired 28 March 2013 Sand 1 April 2013 K * BBC One: The Mystery of Mary Magdalene (Melvin Bragg-presented programme featuring interviews with Kate Cooper, aired 29 March 2013) * BBC Two: Divine Women (Clip of Bettany Hughes interviewing Kate Cooper, ‘Women's Role in the Very Early Days of Christianity‘; aired 11 April 2012) * Trailer clip for BBC Two's Divine Women, featuring Kate Cooper on New Testament Women (Aired 11 April 2012) * BBC Radio 4: ‘Banishing Eve’, Aired 21 and 28 March 2010

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cooper, Kate American classical scholars Women classical scholars 1960 births Living people Harvard Divinity School alumni Princeton University alumni Academics of the University of London Wesleyan University alumni American expatriates in England