Debra Freas holds degrees in Classics and Ancient History from the University of Texas at Austin (B.A.s) and the University of California, Irvine (M.A., Ph.D). She regularly teaches courses in Latin, Greek, Vergil, Catullus, Cicero, imperial literature, and a first-year writing seminar on classical studies and social movements. Having spent most of her life in Texas and southern California, she has come to appreciate all four seasons while living in the Boston area. Dr. Freas specializes in race and ethnicity in Roman studies, feminist epistemology, and sexual violence in Latin literature. She has published articles on topics ranging from gender and genre in Ovid’s Metamorphoses to dramatic structure and philosophy in Senecan tragedy to Petronius’ intertextual engagement with Ovid. She is currently writing a student Latin commentary titled Selections from Petronius’ Satyrica: The Tales of Eumolpus (Bloomsbury, 2024) and three articles that explore blackness in Petronius’ Satyrica, linguistic code switching in Luis Alfaro’s Medea, and the marginalized standpoint of non-Roman women in Petronius’ Widow of Ephesus.